A little apple info and how well it works

I’ve got two apple trees, one red and the other yellow, both delicious types. When my neighbor Lyle had his honey bees here at the house there was no problem with those little workers pollinating everything that could be pollinated. He had to get rid of his bees because of a neighbor that didn’t like honey bees and since then the pollination on everything around here has been minimal at best. Well both of my trees were full of flowers a couple weeks back and I thought well its going to be another year without many apples, soooo.

Walking by the trees one morning before work I thought what the heck I’d try it. I took my finger and touched the flower and worked it around just a little bit thinking maybe I’ll get a couple to a few apples and I wanted to know if it would work with just a simple finger. I took about 5 minutes and went from flower to flower touching each flower. There were flowers that had already reached their peak, some right in the middle of a full bloom and some that hadn’t opened yet.

Well I walked by the tree about 4 or 5 days later and there was a slight growth of an apple starting at the back side of the flower. I walked by a few days after that and sure enough there were apples starting to grow. I thought I’ll give it another few days to see if what my eyes were seeing were indeed little apples starting to grow. After a couple more days they were about the size of just a little smaller then popcorn seeds. I was so happy and impressed I had to count the amount of apples I was seeing. On two limbs I had just under 50 young apples with just a 5 minute experiment.

I read someplace back that you could take a Qtip and touch each flower and that would work. Well seeing is believing and it does work with a very high and good success rate. I don’t know how far along the apples and other fruit trees are up where you guys live, but if theres no bees around you’ve got to try this technique because it does work, and it works good. Next year no bees? I’m going to do the same but with a Qtip because it would hold more pollen. No need to despair because it really does work with little effort. Right now the apples are about the size of a nickel. Next I’m going from flower to flower on my blackberries. You guys ever try this?

There are places in China where they pollinate fruit trees by hand. It’s got to be a lot of work.

Believe it or not Tegg it really isn’t. With an 8′ step ladder and a Qtip I think I could do my 10′ trees and hit probably almost every flower in an hour or less, it really isn’t that much work, infact its enjoyable and maybe just maybe get a better pollination rate then bees, maybe not though too but Id bet it would be close! Beings not all the flowers open at the same time, a guy could go through the tree every 3 days and you could litterly pollinate every flower. I really do think a guy could get a 95% pollination rate or maybe ever better.

I thought even the wind can pollinate the trees. Is that not true?

You could try putting up a mason bee house.
They are very good orchard pollinators
and far less aggressive than honey bees
as they do not produce honey to protect.

No bee hives around me and my cherry tree has a bumper crop this year?

EEL, some trees and plants, corn for example, are pollinated by the wind and don’t need any insects, some are better pollinated by insects. Eye, I’ll look into what a hive is like because My nextdoor neighbor told me we have Mason bees and I’ve seen them but theres not a lot of them so I’ve gotten minimal help there so a hive may do the trick to bring in more around the trees. Suz, I have another friend whos got a plum tree and its loaded with young plums and no honey bees arolund so evidently some fruit trees are easier pollinated then others by whatevers helping them. All I know is the hand method on apple trees works very well, completely surprised the heck out of me.

There are about 425 kinds of bees in Minnesota.
Your trees are probably being pollinated by a non-honey producing variety
like mason bees.

Mason bee house is a small box-like house open in the front.
You insert numerous tubes about 6 inches long and 3/8 in diameter.
they lay 5 female eggs, followed by 2 male eggs in each tube
You can buy the tubes on ebay.
Some people drill 3/8 holes 6 inches deep in a piece of wood

Naturally they would use the reed like plants and lay their eggs
within those.
The various sizes of reeds accommodate different bee species.

I’m just chiming in to say that I really enjoy these mysterious thread topics. Let me walk you through what happened to me.

I login and see a nee recent topic “A little Apple info and how well it works”

But what does it mean? Did mossydan get a new iphone or ipad and he’s letting us know his thoughts? Is he using apples for bait down in Iowa? Or maybe he’s smoking some pork butt and looking to some applewood to provide some of that smokey goodness we all want. Perhaps he’s baiting deer into his back yard with some apples.

I must say, “I hand pollinated some apple trees on my property and it is working better than bees” is definitely not something I would have expected.

At the same time, if your title would have been “The benefits of hand pollinating apple trees as it compares to pollination via bees” I would have not clicked.

So maybe the IDO boys need to thank you for the extra click and the potential extra revenue from an ad click if I want a special deal at Ballards?

Interisting info Eye, No new phone Phil, I have the cheapest one I can buy because two years ago me and the phone went in the water in the middle of the night checking dittypoles, we did catch fish that night though. Can’t bait deer here in Iowa so no apples involved in that. I do have some apple wood from last years trimming of my two trees plus I cut my peach tree down because it died, going to use Both woods for a hog roast sometime in the next few months.

I don’t have any special reason for the title of this thread but thanks for saying its a mysterious one. Maybe because it is just a little info to me and it does work very well. Some guys get a charge out of washing their vehicle, I guess I got mine seeing apples appear when the last few years theres been none, elzippo noneo.

Many fruit trees can be pollinated by hand. A small paint brush is handy tool for doing this, better reach than a Q-tip.

Some trees cannot self-pollinate, so they need to be pollinated by a speperate tree. My apricot trees were like this, you needed a minimum of two trees and after I got them I discovered it was really more like 4 to ensure reliable pollination.

Grouse

Good info Grouse on the paint brush next year I’ll use that instead of a Qtip, do apricot trees grow up north here or did you live somewhere else where they did grow. Apricot jelly is one of my favorites. I have a middle of the night snack about 2twice a week made from Apricot jelly and chunky peanut butter piled up thick, good stuff. I know wild plums grow up north here so why not apricots if that makes any sense. Maybe a guy could cross an apricot with orange and get an apri-orange or a plum with an orange and get a Orplumange, makes sense to me lol,,,

and a fruit tree can be pollinated by a different species of fruit trees.

I didn’t know that EEL but I believe it, wait a minute I did read somewhere where if its a similar type it will pollinate.

I have a question, my apple trees get a lot of bugs on them and they ruin most of my apples, what does everyone do to prevent this??? I would prefer to use some sort of all natural stuff

Here what I would personally do, I’m not much for chemical sprays if I don’t have to use them. Even though most are mild sprays I still don’t like it. Myself Id get intouch with the local nursery in your area and ask them whats used for your area, or maybe if theres an orchard near by go and ask them, they have a lot at risk to save their apples, maybe that’s even better because they have years of experience.

mossydan wrote:

Good info Grouse on the paint brush next year I’ll use that instead of a Qtip, do apricot trees grow up north here or did you live somewhere else where they did grow.

Apricot trees will grow in MN. The trees I lost were newer hybrids called Sugar Pearl and, unfortunately, calling them Zone 4 hardy proved to be optimistic, at least for my planting location.

The tried/true MN varieties are Sungold and Moongold. They cannot self-pollinate, so you need at least two trees unless you have people nearby who also have apricots. Realistically, you need 3-4 trees for reliable pollination. When you get it right, you will have all the apricot jam you ever wanted as they get terrific volume.

kevinh1570 wrote:

I have a question, my apple trees get a lot of bugs on them and they ruin most of my apples, what does everyone do to prevent this??? I would prefer to use some sort of all natural stuff

What you can do to prevent it is to spray.

There are a lot of folksy “natural” theories out there and if any of them worked, then everybody would be using them. Bottom line is there is no reliable, multi-purpose insecticides. Or fungicide, which is the other bane of fruit crops. Some remedies work OK for specific bugs, but using them relies heavily on identifying the problem insect and then treating it quickly.

A multi-purpose fruit tree spray is what you need if you really want to get rid of the pests. A good sprayer is essential so you have enough pressure to get up under the leaves.

Groues

Grouse I want to pick your brain a little, have you ever heard of anyone using Jalapenos that have been liquefied and then strained and pumped onto plants to control insects. I’m one for new remedies if I can find one. What do you think a solution of hot peppers, maybe ghost peppers, mixed with water then sprayed on the plants to kill or keep insects away. I know you’d have to do it after each rain but its natural, think there may be too much acid etc. in the peppers? Think it might work? Maybe use it on cabbage because that’s a plant that insects love,,,

I have to qualify this by saying I don’t have any apples. My father is the apple grower, so I’ve never bothered with trees myself. I have grapes, had apricots until last year. Dad gets nice apples, but he both sprays and uses insect repellents hung in the trees.

The reason organic fruits of all kinds cost much more is that the productivity is much lower due to insect and disease loss. There’s no way around it, as I said there are no organic fungicides or insecticides and if there were, everyone would be using them.

Pepper-based sprays are a common thing that people seem to try for insect problems with all kinds of crops. I think they fall into the category of “repellent” rather than “insecticide” (ie “killer”). I have not personally seen any using jalapenos, most I’ve seen rely on red/cayanne peppers made into a “tea” and sprayed. I don’t know the pros/cons and cautions with applications so I would research carefully before you try anything.

Grouse

Ya grouse, I was thinking of making a hot pepper mix and spraying from a pump up bug sprayer, thanks

I’m curious to see what happens during June Drop. If I remember correctly an apple will have 10 seeds. A tree will automatically thin itself by dropping less viable fruit. I’m wondering if you get poor pollination, meaning you’re only pollinating a few seeds the tree may drop the fruit.

This is the first I’ve heard of a tree thinning itself. You mean in an off year like a dry year or not enough nourishment it will thin itself to save the tree? It will produce seed but only an amount to keep the species alive next year. So maybe in an off spring like not enough moisture it will only produce enough flowers to be pollinated to keep the species alive for next year. Makes sense,,,

We recently got some apple trees and went thru a one day class. Apples have 10 seeds with good pollination directly related to the number of stigma in the apple blossom. If you get less than good pollination a tree will naturally drop a number of apples with fewer than 5 seeds. Chalk it up to evolution the tree knows the difference and why it would drop the fruit. I guess if the reason for apples is to produce seeds it would make sense to only devote energy to the apples that have the best chance.

A great year could lead to too much fruit which you pointed out. The nursery indicated you had to thin the fruit before the fruitlets get larger than 1/2″ dia. Even if thinning occurred later the tree would already set production for the following year. If there’s too much fruit the tree may go into recovery mode and not produce. The recommendation is to only keep the king fruit which would represent the center blossom of the cluster.