Apple and Crabapple harvests

[farmgal]

Hey folks

I know that many of us had droughts in parts of the country and others seemed to have rain daily.. but none the less, how was your apple and crabapple harvests this year.

I got a loaded crabapple tree but not good on my own apple trees, thankfully, I know of a few old apple trees that are wild forage and if need be, I have a amazing local apple U-pick

I like to put up crabapple jelly and at least 6 dozen quart jars of apple sauce for the years use.. The pigs and pasture critters love the extras that don't quite make the mark for the house or are windfall.

[HopeImReady]

I usually pick from the crabapple tree that is at the front of my complex, and usually they are dropping all over like crazy, but this year they are teeny weeny puny things.. not sure it is worth to pick what is there. Must be the drought.

[Learner]

We didn't get any apples or crabapples this year. They all bloomed beautifully, but a late frost came and so nothing came of them. Same went for chokecherries, Saskatoon's, cherries and a few others.

[peppercorn]

lots of rain this year, and hot weather so lots of apples....I will be storing them as apple wine.Brewing away as I type this. Will be strored in non bpa bottles of course.

DSC01882.JPG (68.2 KiB) Viewed 2913 times

[OddDuck]

I spent an hour this evening picking up the ground apples under one of my trees. Got about a third of them cleaned up and sorted. 2 crates for the horses, and 4 crates of the grotty ones are parked near the bee hives. Many of the ground apples were full of honey bees feeding. They go in the worm holes. Not much else for them to collect this year so I will make sure they have continued access to some of the better windfalls.

Of the many apples still remaining on the tree, there are quite a few ranging in size from 2x crabapple- tennis ball. Smallish but the first apple crop in three years. I have three more trees that look like they will have an average crop of the same sizes. Not bad for a drought. The horses have cleaned out the lower apples/crabapples in the back pasture but I cannot possibly pick 10 crabapple trees anyways. I should get a decent amount of apple juice to can. I am kind of wishing I could find a cheap washing machine to make the juice with instead of having to use the apple press and its grinder which is slow.

[farmgal]

great overviews, sorry your crabs were so small hope I am ready, ah, that's to bad learner, we had the same thing happen in 2015 here on the farm, massive hit by late frost.. it did a number for sure, peppercorn, enjoy your wine, I make a fair amount of apple cider vinager but as no one drinks wine in my house, I do not do much that way.. now mead.. that's a different story..

oddduck, very interesting about the bees! and interesting about the grinder an apple press

[Denob]

It's my understanding that the tree we harvest from outside DW's work is full and dropping.
We'll head out this weekend to pick it clean.

[kootenay kid]

In SE B.C., there is a bumper crop of apples. It seems people are already tired of dealing with them, so are letting their unwanted ones drop.....then wonder why they have a bear problem! I am up to my eyeballs in apples and pears, all free from friends. My dehydrator is going round the clock.