A Gardeners Forum Forums General Discussion The Food Garden Forum Apples? Now??

There is an apple tree in our yard. We just moved so I am not familiar with its usual habits, but it is dropping apples. At first they were the size of say, acorns or cherries, and now they are almost as big as my fist (the biggest ones- most are golf ball sized still- but bigger every day!)

They don't have the apple shape, but more the crab-apple shape with the very long stem. They aren't clustered up at all though like the crab apple pics I find online. They are bright/light green and turn brown immediately when cut. We used some last week with store-bought apples to make jelly and it turned out great. They have hardly any flavor, a little sour, but are very 'dry' (make your mouth dry- don't know the word- astringent?) They do have the long cherry-like stems like crab apples.

Are these just possibly green crab apples or is this something else? I have positively identified it as an apple (5 seeds in a star shape and it smells apple-y when cut into.) If they are just green (as in unripe) then why the heck are they falling?

I'm curious! Any info or ideas?

(Also, the tree is tall- very tall- like the same size almost as the old Oaks, so about 40 ft maybe? and not widespread at all, but looks like a typical apple tree in that it's very crookedy in the main trunk.)

Thanks for reading all this rambling! :)
Manda

I know nothing of apples so can't help a bit. But I *do* love your location! "... NC at heart." Made me smile as for 9 years I felt like apologizing... I'm not *really* from Cincinnati, I'm from NC. (We're back in the South now.)

Hope someone comes along soon to help you out.

Can you post a pic of the apple?

I don't have a way to host a photo right now and don't know another way to do it, but there is one in my blog here:

http://chickiepea.wordpress.com/2010/06/25/cleaversandgardens/

look about 1/3 way down the page.

Thanks!

I'd say crab apple..just from the cherry like stem.

To post pics here, you need a host site. I use photobucket..upload there and copy and paste here

How'd the jelly taste?

:) Thanks. It was good- tasted like apple jelly. We don't eat processed sugar at all, so we did have to modify the recipe and use honey, so some of that flavor came though. But who can complain about apple-flavored honey or honey-flavored apples? Not my girls! LOL

Oh my..I'd die without processed sugar. I am a white sugar-aholic..honestly. It's the one bad habit I just cannot kick.

It turns out it was an actual apple, not a crab apple. In mid-Sept, they got huge (though they fell like rain all summer, small and green) and turned a little streaked-red color. The squirrels feasted on them when they turned colors before they would ever drop (taking one bite from each- Arghhhh!)

I keep in touch with the previous owner of our house via email and asked her. She said that the owner before them (back in the 1960s) had started it from a seed from a grocery-store apple!

So there ya have it!

Wow...so are you preserving them?

"real" apples huh?? well You could always cut out 'widely' the 'bad/' places & then either try making applesauce/jelly with them or cut them up for pies & freeze them. I have 2 pies worth in my freezer now---
sometimes I make up the whole filling & freeze it & sometimes I freeze enough apples for each pie in freezer bags.

I use those new Ziplock Freezer bags with vacuum pump for freezer storqe.

Nope, a few dropped but they were beyond saving, and that was in early Sept. They are long gone now. I plan to take care of it next year with some fertilizer, etc and see if I can get it to produce some more, and hopefully pick a few before before the squirrels get them. Guess I will have to drag out the ol' ladder!

Read up on it---MY DH used to prune the trees to help them bear. I do not remember when he did it, and I did not ever watch him do it either, but I am thinking it was fall---.
From the time yo say yours made apples, I am thinking they were possiobly red delicious. ()
Tree grown they are very good eating, but to my notion are too sweet for baking.

Now, having said that, a friend of my DH's gave him a large sack full of the Red delicious that were real nice. First, I made 1 pie & then later I cut up the remaining 12 cups & froze them for 2 pies. later I took out half the apples from each ziptop bag & replaced them with Jonathan apples. (I now have half & half for each pie.) I then fried the 6 cups I removed in a skillet with butter & then added some apple pie spice & some brown sugar---great as a side dish with any kind of pork.

I have more Red delicious that my mom gave to me--I will cut them up & use them to make pies for our churches sausage supper.

Good luck

I don't know... they are more fat than oblong, like I tend to think of Red Delicious as being. The previous owner said they made the best applesauce ever, but taste is in the... mouth? of the beholder!?

Pruning! Duh!!! Yes, thank you for mentioning that. Makes sense!

be sure to read up on proper procedures & times though, I would hate for you to not get any apples next season because you pruned at the wrong time or pruned the wrong amount or at the wrong place.