Hi all...just planted up 50 4 year old grafteds in what i hope to become an orchard. Stock was sposed to be disease and insect free on arival from Alberta grower (cold zone, need standard stock trees, not dwarf or semi-dwarf). Noted leaf curl on "red baron" variety of apple (no, not the crab apple red baron, but a hybrid they came out with out west) but not on the other varieties. soils are heavily conditioned here with peat moss and horse manure as topsoils is sandy, acidic and sparse. Are some plants more sus to diseases? Am also collected wild apple seeds for some grafting experimnets i plan on doing next spring.
Yes, i faithfully sprayed for bugs and disease every two weeks and even went so far as to spray the surrounding bush crabapples and hawthorns. No maggots, but obvious other signs of distress. Anyone else growing apples in hostile 3A/B zones? Besides deer rabbits and mice, what other winter killlers do i have to look forward to? Cheers, had to do the apple thing to attract deer and wild turkeys to the property. Yes, the trees are fenced high and tight.