Update on Garden Projects:Apples

Sticky trap hanging in the Chicago Botanic Gardens (CBG).


This is a picture of some apples on an espaliered apple tree at the CBG. The black blemishes show the apple has been infected by either apple fly maggot or codling moth.

The CBG is in the fourth year of their organic gardening project. They have a number of apple trees, which I have to assume are also under the same organic dictates. The CBG was not bagging the "king" apple. They did not allow the grass to grow under their feet, so to speak. Some organic apple growers cite a dense, taller grass as a method to prevent or lesser the number of insect going to ground during certain life stages of the insect.



These are great tips, but they don't go far enough. Seeing the heavily-dimpled and spotted apples, the CBG will not have many, if any, blemish-free apples this fall.

As you might remember, I used a dormant oil spray in late February. In May, when I had nearly complete petal drop I sprayed with the chemical Malathion, not an organic choice. The recommendation is spraying at 75 percent petal drop. High winds took the trees from no petal drop to complete petal drop in the matter of hours.

The idea of Malathion use is treating codling moth and apple fly maggot during particular life stages. Another application will be done in the third week of July. I also hung sticky traps to capture apple fly maggot. These application of Malathion at specific dates are in contrast to spraying every two weeks.

If you do not have tall grass under your apple trees, black landscape fabric is recommended. I did not put down landscape fabric, but I do have my apple trees under planted with lilies, onions, and alliums.

So far I see no dimples, frass (a extruded gooey jelly typically from the blossom end), or any other blemishes that signals larval insect damage.

I am hopeful.

Two sprayings and a dose of dormant oil, the last a good two months before harvest, seems a lot better than regular twice monthly spraying. This one application of Malathion has been the only pesticide or fungicide has been the only chemical use in either the potager or family garden necessary so far this season.

Now, if I could get the Mantis tiller to cooperate!

Organic Apples: Know Your Enemies

Image Source Page: http://www.agf.gov.bc.ca/cropprot/applemaggot.htm
Male apple fly


As you might know, I am trying to grow my apples this year with as few chemicals as possible. The major pest I experience is the codling moth. This moth is about 5/8" long and sort of a brownish-gray innocuous moth. To control this moth I used dormant oil during my tree's dormancy and sprayed it with Malathion when 75% of the petals had dropped. I will spray it again the third week in July. If you are working with a large number of trees, your choice can be more organic than mine. A coating of fine particle kaolin clay in the form of WP Surround might be a feasible choice monetarily. It is also recommended the ground is covered, either with dense, tall grass or a black, landscape fabric.

A pest I never thought was part of the mix for me is the apple fly maggot. While the codling moth is fairly invisible, unless you are trapping for it, the apple fly maggot is probably mistaken for some sort of biting fly. For this pest, I have hung red shiny object (you traditionally see the hanging red balls) coated with Tanglefoot. Tanglefoot is a typically organic-approved pest control. It is a rain-proof super-sticky paste that can be applied to the object you with to use as a trap. I have used this before and never caught any bees, just tiny flies. This year, I have actually seen the apple fly, so I hope I will be successful capturing those. Typically, they lay their eggs, from which the maggot develop, the third week in June.

Blooming Potential!

Pear 'Seckl' flower buds, maybe hundreds of buds!

Where there are flowers, there is the potential for fruit! My mini-orchard is starting to bear up to its promise.





















Apricot 'Moorpark'

Cherry 'Lapin'


Grape buds! Finally!


My 'Honeycrisp' apple, for the first time looks to have buds of some sort. Some are flower and some leaves, until today, I had very little to tell me the tree was anything other than dead.

Not all the flower buds will be pollinated and not all will bear fruit. There is always the possibility of a killing frost this spring, and pests.

Spraying Apple Trees and the Organic Way

I have a gorgeous dwarf apple tree 'Honeycrisp'. The first year it bore fruit, it produced 44 perfect incredible apples. I did nothing but water it when the fruit grew heavy and the rain scarce.

I thought, "This is great! These new varieties really are pest and disease free!"

The next year-- ugh! Wormy, icky apples.

So I figured, okay. Organic controls. I read about the pests. Identified mine. And went about controlling this pest with red sticky balls. I planted garlic under my tree. I limbed it up a bit, less splash from the soil. I opened up the branching structure, better airflow. I studied the growth cycle of the icky coddling moth. I patrolled my tree for apples showing they had been infected, picking up any windfall, picking off any on the tree, trying to stymie the 40-day life cycle of the moth. I raked up the leaves and plastic bagged them along with any infected apple.

You are probably thinking, okay, she's going to have some beautiful apples, and some she will be able to use, but which will have some blemishing.

I really ended up with squat, zip, zilch, nada.

So I talked to UW-Extension agents. They pretty much told me to try all these things I had already done. Have I mentioned my grandfather was an orchardist in the 1960s? I know just a bit about growing apples. I could identify a couple dozen apples you have probably never seen, let alone eaten before I was 10. I just don't want to use arsenic, lead, and DDT to get beautiful apples.

To be completely honest, there is one organic method I have not tried. Bagging the "king" apple. in this one, you literally seal up the biggest apple, or king apple, in each cluster in a zip lock bag right on the tree, and pick off the other apples in the cluster. Does this sound crazy to anyone other than me?

So last year, I decided I'm going to spray. I thought dormant oil is the least toxic of my options. I read up how to do it and did it. No good. I decided I must have missed the first emergence of the coddling moth.

So, yesterday, with over a foot of snow still on the ground, I got out my sprayer to spray my apple tree with dormant oil. Did I mention I saw a mosquito yesterday? (I killed it; I figure it is worth 10,000 kills this time of year.) I didn't stop there. I sprayed everything in the rosacae family. See, the only other thought is that these coddling moths may have over-wintered on some other host plant. I want apples!

Some of you are thinking, dormant oil? That IS approved for organic use. Yes. I have read that, too.

So here is the kicker, the cautionary tale. I figured, timing is important, but also I need to be much more exacting on the ratio of dormant oil to water. Hunting a measuring device (I don't want to use my kitchen measures for dormant oil.) is always problematic. But, aha! I have one of those little plastic cup measures enclosed with liquid cough medicine. Yippee, a good, well-labeled easy to use measure, at my fingertips!

So I clean my sprayer. Measure out the water. Use my hand measure to add the dormant oil. I wade through a foot of snow and spray my trees. Even though there is a foot of snow, it got up to 50 degrees yesterday and is still above 40 degrees. I need to refill. I get the water and go to add the required measure of dormant oil, only to find the dormant oil has eaten through and dissolved the plastic measuring cup!

Dormant oil is an approved organic? It can dissolve plastics?