Monday, July 22, 2013

An Apple a Day?

Two years ago, Mandy discovered something while walking the dog one day. She found three nice apple trees along the dirt road where we walk the mutt and all three of these trees appeared to be producing apples in overdrive because there were apples and more apples all over the ground and many still on the trees too.

She and the kids picked a bunch of them and brought them home for me to make pie or cobbler or some such with them. Well, I did that and also, cooked up a big batch of homemade applesauce as well.

The applesauce was a really big hit with both the grandkids here as well as with other family members who might have been here to dine with us on some occasions.

With the applesauce success, I then started gathering apples from these trees -the trees are on land that is pretty much abandoned so no danger of getting in trouble with any neighbors then for swiping the fruit. I cooked up several batches of applesauce and then froze it so we enjoyed the good homemade applesauce almost up to last spring.

I was really looking forward to the apple gathering again last fall but sadly, the apple blossoms on those trees and on all the apple trees around the town as well as the township too, had the same fate befall them.

No apples to pick and cook for anything last year.

So this spring, when I saw the first buds on the trees and then the pretty blossoms, I watched them with fingers crossed and said prayers too that there wouldn't be a hard, hard frost or a late heavy snowfall that would come through and kill them off again this year.

Thankfully, they survived and so, Maya and I have been watching those 3 trees like a pair of hawks -trying to see how many apples seemed to be growing on them. We even discovered a 4th tree right near these three -much smaller and it looks like it might be a very young tree and these are maybe it's first year of producing anything but it seems to have a pretty ample supply growing there now.

Just about every day, when I walk Sammy, as I go by these trees, I find myself staring at the apples growing and counting -or trying to count -how many apples I can spot on each tree. Yesterday, between the 4 trees, I counted over 200 apples in the growth stage!

That got my stomach to yearning for this years batches of home-cooked applesauce that I have planned for the freezer pretty soon.

Yesterday, I also took some pictures of the trees and their lovely crops! I thought I'd share a couple of those pictures today with you too. Hope you can see the apples and maybe they'll make you a bit hungry too for apple pie or cobbler or applesauce too!

The apple on this tree is on the tree that appears to have the least amount of production and the most I've been able to count on it -could be more as sometimes they are pretty well hidden -is about 18-20 apples.

The problem with trying to take pictures while you're also trying to control a dog on the lease is that often you get a jerk on the lease at the most inopportune time. That's why this picture is a bit blurry but I think you can make out a fairly good number of apples growing on it -just look for tiny lighter green orbs! (This is also from the younger tree I mentioned too.)
Yet another yank on the lease and I end up with a bit of a blurry photo but you should be able to see three apples about in the center, clumped together.
These apples are on the first apple tree we pass by on our walk and it seems to be the one that is the most productive this year as I have counted at least 6 dozen apples on it!

The tree holding these apples and a fairly decent amount of others on it, isn't on our normal walking route but is located down by the bridge over the Sulfur Creek (correct name of the creek is "Moravian Run"_ and this is just below the house that my great-uncle, Erik Eld, used to own.

The tree in the middle here has enough apples on it that can be seen from the street as we walk by and it is located near the kitchen window of Uncle Erik's old homestead which now belongs to a great couple -Jodi and Tony and their son, Travis. (I know too from years long gone by that it produces very good cooking apples as my uncle always sent apples from it up to my Grandma so she could cook up all kinds of yummy apple treats plus -she would make applesauce and can it in big quart jars for our winter meals!

These apple trees are also on Jodi and Tony's property (used to belong to my great-uncle) and are young trees that they have planted since they bought the house and moved in there. If I remember correctly, Jodi told me these are "Delicous" apples that they yield and two years ago, when there was really a bumper crop of apples around the neighborhood, she invited the grandkids, Mandy and me to come down and take as many apples as we wanted as there was way more than she and Tony could handle. And I'm sure you know now too that we beat a path down there and hauled a whole lot of apples home from those trees.

So there you have it now -a little tour of the apples in production within about a quarter to a third of a mile at most from my home!

So you know too I'm really looking forward to when they are ripe and ready to be gathered up and used!

Apple Fever! It's looming here for me!

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