My Top 5 Crabapples

Fish

Well-Known Member
I wanted to start a fall crabapple thread on my top 5 crabapple trees I have growing on the home 10.
These are my top 5 and not necessarily the best 5 for anyone else to plant. Here is the history:

About ten years ago I purchased the adjoining 5 acres beside my original 5 acres where my house was built. This ground was a crop field, but I wanted an orchard and a woods. Part of my tree purchases then was a 100 tree bundle of crabapple seedlings from the state nursery. I planted these crabapples along the road front and down the north property line of my property. This consumed about 75 of those trees. The others were planted here and there on the property and have since been swallowed up by deer or cut down for fear of spreading fireblight to my orchard trees.

After a number of years, I decided to graft some of the crabs over to eating varieties. My orchard was suffering terribly from fireblight, so any diseased crabapples were cut down along my property edges. When I was finished, I had 5 of those original 100 seedlings that I considered to be very good crabapples for wildlife. A 6th is still under evaluation (produces only a few fruits that will not drop!)

Those 5 crabs that I kept are different from one another in a lot of ways. They all have two key elements. Little to no disease issues and quality fruit. I usually spray these trees one time in the early spring and once again for Japanese Beetles. The early spring spraying is arguably not needed.
 
So let's start with the first to ripen. I named this tree August Apricot. This tree produces loads of orange hued fruits that drop in late August. I like it simply for a primer. The deer are getting trained to eat under those trees well before deer season. I have noticed little if any fireblight in August Apricot. It's one downfall is that some fruits will "mummy" on the tree and not fall. This is probably a fungal issue.
The tree has long, weeping branches.

Beautiful fruit. About the size of a quarter.

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A little weedy....

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Long, weeping branches.
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And the fruit is on the ground. Deer are taking notice.
Like I said, I kept this tree as a primer for the coming season. Great location for late summer trail camera photos.
My cam is down the edge about 30 yards, but it's getting lots of traffic.

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As the others get closer to their dropping times, I will post information on them. One of those will be soon in September.
 
Fish, I have been looking forward to this thread ever since you mentioned it a while back....................
 
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I sure hope those of you that know what's what will help me and others understand how to start good crabapples that will produce and avoid any disease. I appreciate Fish starting this. Got my fingers crossed that yall can wise this southern boy up. :)
 
Thanks for following along fellas.
WP, i suppose if i were new to planting crabs, I would look at some of the disease resistant varieties out there on the market. Orchards use some varieties for pollinating their orchards, but youve got to know the fruit size. Seems that Golden Hornet is popular, but if i remember right, the fruits are very small. Another way to add crabs to a property is to graft proven trees from other properties.
I am offering scionwood from these trees to anyone interested in trying them.

Second, it sure helps to know what disease looks like. This would be primarily scab, cedar apple rust, and fireblight. Have you seen old crabs in somebody's yard that are defoliated by August? Thats the work of scab, which many older varieties were prone to get.

Stay tuned.....
 
In for the interest of apples, quarters aren't real big though. :)

If the crab fruits were as large as eating varieties, you would get only a fraction of the production. This tree probably produces as much fruit as any eating variety putting out 3" apples.
They're just bite size. :D
 
Seems like you specialize in crabapples.so maybe I can ask a question.i have a couple trees that were some of the first I planted maybe 7 years ago.Instead of apple size they produced fruit this year that is about the size of a nickel.They are turning red but still very hard.Any ideas?
 
Seems like you specialize in crabapples.so maybe I can ask a question.i have a couple trees that were some of the first I planted maybe 7 years ago.Instead of apple size they produced fruit this year that is about the size of a nickel.They are turning red but still very hard.Any ideas?

Were they a known variety of apple or were they apple seedlings for wildlife? If this is the first year I would see if the small fruits actually drops from the tree and has any value to wildlife. A lot of apple seedlings (grown from seed) will produce very small fruit that won't fall from the tree and provides no value to deer. If this is the case then I would graft these trees to a known variety that will benefit both you and the deer
 
I haven't done any grafting so my other option would be spade them out and replace with some apples that I need to move this spring
 
Seems like you specialize in crabapples.so maybe I can ask a question.i have a couple trees that were some of the first I planted maybe 7 years ago.Instead of apple size they produced fruit this year that is about the size of a nickel.They are turning red but still very hard.Any ideas?

Yes, i am also curious if these were tagged "dolgo" or something similar trees, or if they were seed grown?
Seed grown trees will be one of a kind. Just have to see what you get.
Watch them this fall and see what happens with fruit drop. A tree loaded with nickel sized fruit that drops would be a keeper for me if other things such as dropping and disease worked out.
Just depends on the space you have available and if you need the best variety working for you in every
tree.
Thanks for checking in!
 
I haven't done any grafting so my other option would be spade them out and replace with some apples that I need to move this spring

Dont shy away from grafting. It requires watching a couple YouTube vids and very little expense. ;)
And its good fun.
 
Were they a known variety of apple or were they apple seedlings for wildlife? If this is the first year I would see if the small fruits actually drops from the tree and has any value to wildlife. A lot of apple seedlings (grown from seed) will produce very small fruit that won't fall from the tree and provides no value to deer. If this is the case then I would graft these trees to a known variety that will benefit both you and the deer

Exactly. A good many of my seed grown crabs grew pea sized fruit that never fell anyway. They have been relieved of duty and my better varieties grafted to them in some cases.
Thats why a tree producing quarter or half-dollar size fruit gets a second look.
 
This is a pic of a Profusion Crabapple purchased last summer at half price from Lowe's for $10. It hasn't grown a lot but already has some crabapples about the size of a dime on it. I planted it primarily as a pollinator for three apple trees that I planted in the same plot because it was listed as a "Flowering" tree rather than a "Fruit" tree. The fruits are a bonus!

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Nice Keith! Those small fruits won't be wasted as they feed everything from rabbits to quail to whitetails.
 
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