Pruning fruit

Pruning fruit trees

Pruning fruit trees is a technique that is employed by gardeners to control growth, remove dead or diseased wood or stimulate the formation of flowers and fruit buds. The most economical pruning is done early in the season, when buds begin to break, and one can pinch off the soft tissue with one's fingers (hence the expression "nipped in the bud"). Many home fruit growers make the mistake of planting a tree, then neglecting it until it begins to bear. But careful attention to pruning and training young trees will ultimately determine their productivity and longevity. Good pruning and training will also prevent later injury from weak crotches that break under snow or fruit load.

Apple

Apple

Apples are self incompatible and must be cross pollinated. Pollination management is an important component of apple culture. Before planting, it is important to arrange for pollenizers - varieties of apple or crabapple that provide plentiful, viable and compatible pollen. Orchard blocks may alternate rows of compatible varieties, or may plant crabapple trees, or graft on limbs of crabapple. Some varieties produce very little pollen, or the pollen is sterile, so these are not good pollenizers. Good-quality nurseries have pollenizer compatibility lists.
Growers with old orchard blocks of single varieties sometimes provide bouquets of crabapple blossoms in drums or pails in the orchard for pollenizers. Home growers with a single tree and no other variety in the neighborhood can do the same on a smaller scale.
During the bloom each season, apple growers usually provide pollinators to carry the pollen. Honeybee hives are most commonly used, and arrangements may be made with a commercial beekeeper who supplies hives for a fee. Orchard mason bees are also used as supplemental pollinators in commercial orchards. Home growers may find these more acceptable in suburban locations because they do not sting. Some wild bees such as carpenter bees and other solitary bees may help. Bumble bee queens are sometimes present in orchards, but not usually in enough quantity to be significant pollinators.
Symptoms of inadequate pollination are small and misshapen apples, and slowness to ripen. The seeds can be counted to evaluate pollination. Well-pollinated apples are the best quality, and will have seven to ten seeds. Apples with fewer than three seeds will usually not mature and will drop from the trees in the early summer. Inadequate pollination can result from either a lack of pollinators or pollenizers, or from poor pollinating weather at bloom time. It generally requires multiple bee visits to deliver sufficient grains of pollen to accomplish complete pollination.

HEALTH BENIFIT

HEALTH BENIFIT

An old proverb attests to the health benefits of the fruit: "An apple a day keeps the doctor away." Research suggests that apples may reduce the risk of colon cancer, prostate cancer and lung cancer.[3] Like many fruits, apples contain Vitamin C as well as a host of other antioxidant compounds, which may reduce the risk of cancer by preventing DNA damage. The fiber content, while less than in most other fruits, helps regulate bowel movements and may thus reduce the risk of colon cancer. They may also help with heart disease, weight loss and controlling cholesterol, as they do not have any cholesterol, have fibre (which reduces cholesterol by preventing reabsorption), and are bulky for their caloric content like most fruits and vegetables.
There is evidence that in vitro, apples possess phenolic compounds which may be cancer-protective and demonstrate antioxidant activity.[4] The predominant phenolic phytochemicals in apples are quercetin, epicatechin, and procyanidin B2.[5]
The seeds are mildly poisonous, containing a small amount of amygdalin, a cyanogenic glycoside, but a large amount would need to be chewed to have any toxic effect.[

The trees

The trees are susceptible to a number of fungal

The trees are susceptible to a number of fungal and bacterial diseases and insect pests. Nearly all commercial orchards pursue an aggressive program of chemical sprays to maintain high fruit quality, tree health, and high yields. A trend in orchard management is the use of organic methods. These use a less aggressive and direct methods of conventional farming. Instead of spraying potent chemicals, often shown to be potentially dangerous and maleficent to the tree in the long run, organic methods include encouraging or discouraging certain cycles and pests.
Leaves with significant insect damage. An apple rotting on the stemTo control a specific pest, organic growers might encourage the prosperity of its natural predator instead of outright killing it, and with it the natural biochemistry around the tree. Organic apples generally have the same or greater taste than conventionally grown apples, with reduced cosmetic appearances.
Among the most serious disease problems are fireblight, a bacterial disease; and Gymnosporangium rust, apple scab, and black spot, three fungal diseases.
The plum curculio is the most serious insect pest. Others include Apple maggot and codling moth.
Young apple trees are also prone to mammal pests like mice and deer, which feed on the soft bark of the trees, especially in winter.
Organic apples are commonly produced in the United States.[2] Organic production is difficult in Europe, though a few orchards have done so with commercial success, using disease-resistant cultivars and the very best cultural controls. The latest tool in the organic repertoire is a spray of a light coating of kaolin clay, which forms a physical barrier to some pests, and also helps prevent apple sun scald.

Apple breeding

Apple breeding

In this hybrid of an orchard apple with a red-fruited crabapple cultivar, the pulp is of the same colour as the peel. Seeds of the above apple, which are same colour as the rest of the fruit. Apple tree in flowerLike most perennial fruits, apples ordinarily propagate asexually by grafting. Seedling apples are different from their parents, sometimes radically. Most new apple cultivars originate as seedlings, which either arise by chance or are bred by deliberately crossing cultivars with promising characteristics. The words 'seedling', 'pippin', and 'kernel' in the name of an apple cultivar suggest that it originated as a seedling. Apples can also form bud sports (mutations on a single branch). Some bud sports turn out to be improved strains of the parent cultivar. Some differ sufficiently from the parent tree to be considered new cultivars.
Some breeders have crossed ordinary apples with crabapples or unusually hardy apples in order to produce hardier cultivars. For example, the Excelsior Experiment Station of the University of Minnesota has, since the 1930s, introduced a steady progression of important hardy apples that are widely grown, both commercially and by backyard orchardists, throughout Minnesota and Wisconsin. Its most important introductions have included 'Haralson' (which is the most widely cultivated apple in Minnesota), 'Wealthy', 'Honeygold', and 'Honeycrisp'

The apple

The apple

The apple is the pomaceous fruit of the apple tree, species Malus domestica in the rose family Rosaceae. It is one of the most widely cultivated tree fruits. The tree is small and deciduous, reaching 5-12 m tall, with a broad, often densely twiggy crown.
The leaves are alternately arranged simple ovals 5-12 cm long and 3-6 cm broad on a 2-5 cm petiole with an acute tip, serrated margin and a slightly downy underside. Flowers are produced in spring simultaneous with the budding of the leaves.
The flowers are white with a pink tinge that gradually fades, five petaled, 2.5-3.5 cm in diameter. The fruit matures in autumn, and is typically 5-9 cm diameter. The centre of the fruit contains five carpels arranged in a five-point star, each carpel containing one to three seeds.

Legal points

Legal points

The practice of patent protection (legally protecting) is an important tool to encourage the development of new useful cultivars, the practice is considered unethical by some people. To others,"protected cultivars" are the result of deliberate breeding program and selection activity by nurseries or plant breeders, and are often the result of years of work. "Plant patents" and "plant breeder's rights" (which can be expensive to obtain) is one of the means for the breeder or inventor to obtain financial reward for their work.[3]
With plants produced by genetic engineering becoming more widely used, the companies producing these plants (or plants produced by traditional means) often claim a patent on their product. Plants so controlled retain certain rights that accrue not to the grower, but to the firm or agency that engineered the variety.
Some plants are often labeled "PBR", which stands for "plant breeders' rights", or "PVR", which stands for "plant variety rights." It is illegal in countries that obey international law to harvest seeds from a patented "variety" except for personal use. Other means of legal protection include the use of trade marked names whereby the name the plant is sold under, is trademarked but the plant its self not protected. Trademarking a name is inexpensive and requires less work, while patents can take a few years to be granted and have a greater expense. Some previously named cultivars have been renamed and sold under trademarked names.
In horticulture, plants that are patented or trade marked are often licensed to large whole-sellers that multiply and distribute the plants to retail sellers. The whole-sellers pay a fee to the patent or trade mark holders for each plant sold, those plants that are patented are labeled with "It's unlawful to propagate this plant" or a similar phrase. Typically the license agreement specifies that a plant must be sold with a tag thus marketed to help ensure that unlawfully produced plants are not sold.