These are about the second cleanest wild apples I've found in our S.W. Michigan area, the worst area for apples I've ever seen. Apple performance can be either from growing conditions or apple characteristics. The BEST wild apples I've ever seen in S.W. Michigan were on an old tree next to some other street apples that were absolute rubbish. In that case, it was the variety characeristics that somehow provided it protection against insect damage. In this case, it's probably a mix of the variety and the location. There are no other wild cherries or fruit trees nearby, nothing else that can host curculio or other insect pests. There IS one other crab apple, and it's rubbish, so the variety does have some resistance. First, it's EXTREMELY abundant, one of the most abundant apple trees I've seen, probably in the top 10% at least. And it has an alternating habit, only fruiting heavily once every other year or every few years. This means that there's no consistent host for pest populations to build up. And with SO MUCH FRUIT, the fruit that's hit early just drops, and the remaining insect damaged fruit is maybe only 25-39%. However, the fruit are very small, something between a large crab and a small malus domestica (culinary apple.) The flavor is very sweet, no tartness, like a red delicious, with a similar texture to red delicious. But this is the sort of thing smart growers can put to use in their designs. #wildapples #Organicfruit #Permaculture https://www.instagram.com/p/B4DGN8uJTZT/?igshid=19qs2bqvbbnir
