which apple trees are best

[Barnowl]

Only planted our Winter Gem in May but did have  3 or 4apples off it, which were very tasy with a good texture.

[Barnowl]

[angle shades]

:)
I bought 3 apple trees from Morrisons this year to grow as cordons,Lord Lambourne,Worcester Pearmain and Sunset(the jury is out wether WP can be grown as a cordon).LL had one apple this year and was blooming delicious ;D /shades x

[calendula]

worcester pearmain is a tip bearer  :-\ and that would be one reason why the extra pruning for a cordon wouldn't be the best idea

[vee]

Really pleased to hear that Sunset is a good apple variety. I planted one late last winter and it had lots of blossom on it but not one apple survived.  :'( I'm hoping that now it's established it will do better next season.

[calendula]

sounds like the blossom wasn't pollinated - what do you have nearby that will do the job?

[Robert_Brenchley]

How old was it? I've had very young trees flower without setting. It's better if they don't at that stage since you want growth rather than having the tree use all its strength in bearing.

[vee]

The tree was from Ken Muir but I don't know how old it was when I planted it - it just came by post.  ;)
Pollination may be the problem. There's a James Grieve on the next but one plot but that's quite new too, as it was planted the year before.
I have a new neighbour who has planted a cox, a bramley and another that I can't remember so there's three of us in a row with apples.

Although I do seem to remember quite a few tiny apples but they all dropped off - would they form without pollination?

[Si]

No, they were pollinated :)

[Robert_Brenchley]

They drop off when the tree can't suport them to maturity; it's known as 'June drop'. Cox's and James Grieve will pollinate Sunset.

[Rhys]

I'm planning to plant a row of apple cordons but am not sure of which materials to use for the structure - posts in concrete, metposts and wood, galvanised metal tubing? 
I want the structure to last for decades. Any advice welcomed.

I would recommend Scrumptious - it crops when young and tastes of cherries and sometimes aniseed (Sep).

[cambourne7]

Mm, that's one thing I'm a bit worried about as we plan to have a couple of trees in the front garden, and I'll be pretty annoyed if people start taking lots of them. Course, this is why the other one's a bitter-tasting cooking apple. :D

Katy sounds good in terms of disease resistance & hardiness, also the flavour sounds really nice. (I'm not the only one that buys apple trees without knowing what they taste like, am I?)

As for them keeping.. we make lots of homebrew, so any leftovers will be turned into apple wine. :D

I went to ken muir apple day with the express thought in my mind that i would not by anything and if i did i wanted one apple and one pear/

I bought 3 apples and 1 pear as i tasted them and they were devine! ( also tried the juice and i am sure blended they would make excelent home brew )

I picked Pixe ( packed with taste ) desert apple, Bardsey ( worlds rarest apple ) a cooker that tastes wonderful raw wow and kids orange red (my personal fav) yum yum. The pear i got was an asian pear as i dont like the taste of english pears unless there cooked and the asian pears are expensive ( and my neighbour has an english pear so i am sure there will be some swapping going in.)

I compromised ( told myself at the time anyway ) that i would put the later flowering ones in the garden at home and the earlier one and the pear on the lottie, there on m26 rootstock and i plan to train as cordon. I want to bang in some wooden steaks at the weekend and add some wooden verticals to help protect against wind and tie the apple & pear to in the area to the right of my shed which should be nice and sheltered.

I am going to be putting a climbing rose there as well as a peony shrub so that i have a little peice of calm in the summer. Just need a bench!

So this weekend i will be hammering in the posts for the apple area and the posts for the grapevines while the clay is soft. ( 12 posts for the grapes and 3 for the apple area ) Which leaves me the winter to work out how to get the wire to stay tight.