To form an orchard, standard trees should be planted at from 25 to 40 ft. between the rows, according to the fertility of the soil and other considerations. The trees should be selected with clean, straight, self-supporting stems, and the head should be shapely and symmetrical, with the main branches well balanced. In order to obtain such a stem, all the leaves on the first shoot from the graft or bud should be encouraged to grow, and in the second season the terminal bud should be allowed to develop a further leading shoot, while the lateral shoots should be allowed to grow, but so that they do not compete with the leader, on which the growth of leaves should be encouraged in order that they may give additional strength to the stem below them. The side shoots should be removed gradually, so that the diminution of foliage in this direction may not exceed the increase made by the new branches and shoots of the upper portion. Dwarf pyramids, which occupy less space than open dwarfs, if not allowed to grow tall, may be planted at from 10 to 12 ft. apart. Dwarf bush trees may be planted from 10 to 15 ft. apart, according to the variety and the soil. Dwarf bushes on the Paradise stock are both ornamental and useful in small gardens, the trees being always conveniently under control. These bush trees, which must be on the proper stock—the French Paradise—may be planted at first 6 ft. apart, with the same distance between the rows, the space being afterwards increased, if desired, to 12 ft. apart, by removing every alternate row.
“Cordons” are trees trained to a single shoot, the laterals of which are kept spurred. They are usually trained horizontally, at about 1½ ft. from the ground, and may consist of one stem or of two, the stems in the latter case being trained in opposite directions. In cold districts the finer sorts of apples may be grown against walls as upright or oblique cordons. From these cordon trees very fine fruit may often be obtained. The apple may also be grown as an espalier tree, a form which does not require much lateral space. The ordinary trained trees for espaliers and walls should be planted 20 ft. apart.
The fruit of the apple is produced on spurs which form on the branchlets of two years old and upwards, and continue fertile for a series of years. The principal pruning should be performed in summer, the young shoots if crowded being thinned out, and the superabundant laterals shortened by breaking them half through. The general winter pruning of the trees may take place any time from the beginning of November to the beginning of March, in open weather. The trees are rather subject to the attacks of the American blight, the white cottony substance found on the bark and developed by an insect (Eriosoma, mali), somewhat similar to the green-fly of the garden, but not a true aphis. It may be removed by scrubbing with a hard brush, by painting the affected spots with any bland oil, or by washing them with dilute paraffin and soft soap.
The apple-blossom weevil (Anthonomus pomorum), a small reddish-brown beetle, often causes serious damage to the flowers. The female bores and lays an egg in the unopened bud, and the maggot feeds on the stamens and pistil. The weevil hibernates in the crannies of the bark or in the soil at the base of the trees, and bandages of tarred doth placed round the stem in spring will prevent the female from crawling up.
The codlin moth (Carpocapsa pomonana) lays its eggs in May in the calyx of the flowers. The young caterpillar, which is white with black head and neck, gnaws its way through the fruit, and pierces the rind. When nearly full grown it attacks the core, and the fruit soon drops. The insect emerges and spins its cocoon in a crack of the bark.
To check this disease the apples which fall before ripening should be promptly removed. A loosely made hay-band twisted round the stem about a foot from the ground is of use. The grubs will generally choose the bands in which to make their cocoon; at the end of the season the bands are collected and burned.
The following are a few of the most approved varieties of the apple tree, arranged in order of their ripening, with the months in which they are in use:—
| Dessert Apples. | |
| White Juneating | July |
| Early Red Margaret | Aug. |
| Irish Peach | Aug. |
| Devonshire Quarrenden | Aug., Sept. |
| Duchess of Oldenburg | Aug., Sept. |
| Red Astrachan | Sept. |
| Kerry Pippin | Sept., Oct. |
| Peasgood’s Nonesuch | Sept.-Nov. |
| Sam Young | Oct.-Dec. |
| King of the Pippins | Oct.-Jan. |
| Cox’s Orange Pippin | Oct.-Feb. |
| Court of Wick | Oct.-Mar. |
| Blenheim Pippin | Nov.-Feb. |
| Sykehouse Russet | Nov.-Feb. |
| Fearn’s Pippin | Nov.-Mar. |
| Mannington’s Pearmain | Nov.-Mar. |
| Margil | Nov.-Mar. |
| Ribston Pippin | Nov.-Mar. |
| Golden Pippin | Nov.-Jan. |
| Reinette de Canada | Nov.-Apr. |
| Ashmead’s Kernel | Nov.-Apr. |
| White Winter Calville (grown under glass) | Dec.-Mar. |
| Braddick’s Nonpareil | Dec.-Apr. |
| Court-pendû Plat | Dec.-Apr. |
| Northern Spy | Dec.-May |
| Cornish Gilliflower | Dec.-May |
| Scarlet Nonpareil | Jan.-Mar. |
| Cockle’s Pippin | Jan.-Apr. |
| Lamb Abbey Pearmain | Jan.-May |
| Old Nonpareil | Jan.-May |
| Duke of Devonshire | Feb.-May |
| Sturmer Pippin | Feb.-June |
| Kitchen Apples. | |
| Keswick Codlin | Aug.-Sept. |
| Lord Suffield | Aug.-Sept. |
| Manks Codlin | Aug.-Oct. |
| Ecklinville Seedling | Aug.-Nov. |
| Stirling Castle | Aug.-Nov. |
| New Hawthornden | Sept.-Oct. |
| Stone’s Seedling | Sept.-Nov. |
| Emperor Alexander | Sept.-Dec. |
| Waltham Abbey Seedling | Sept.-Jan. |
| Cellini | Oct., Nov. |
| Gravenstein | Oct.-Dec. |
| Hawthornden | Oct.-Dec. |
| Baumann’s Red Winter Reinette | Nov.-Mar. |
| Mère de Ménage | Oct.-Mar. |
| Beauty of Kent | Oct.-Feb. |
| Yorkshire Greening | Oct.-Feb. |
| Gloria Mundi | Nov.-Jan. |
| Blenheim Pippin | Nov.-Feb. |
| Tower of Glammis | Nov.-Feb. |
| Warner’s King | Nov.-Mar. |
| Alfriston | Nov.-Apr. |
| Northern Greening | Nov.-Apr. |
| Reinette de Canada | Nov.-Apr. |
| Bess Pool | Nov.-May |
| Winter Queening | Nov.-May |
| Lane’s Prince Albert | Oct.-May |
| Norfolk Beaufin | Nov.-July |
Apples for table use should have a sweet juicy pulp and rich aromatic flavour, while those suitable for cooking should possess the property of forming a uniform soft pulpy mass when boiled or baked. In their uncooked state they are not very digestible, but when cooked they form a very safe and useful food, exercising a gentle laxative influence.
According to Hutchison their composition is as follows:—