This tree is amazingly easy to take care of. When we moved, we found this planted in a broken wine barrel and looked terrible. I didn’t even realize it was an apple tree. I gave it a good pruning and replanted into the ground. It produces apples 2 times a year and had had no pest or disease issues. I just came across the original pictures I took of it and was shocked to see the difference.
BEFORE
AFTER
Well done. I have two Anna apples - one is espaliered and planted in a terrible place - I think it is in 100% shade on the north side of our house, against the outside of our fireplace. It is full of apples this year. The other one is tucked behind a Sweet Bagel peach tree and I’ve kept it really small. It, too, is full of apples this year. You did a very, very nice job pruning it to a single trunk. Looks great. How many years between the “before” and “after” photos?
Wow, what a difference! I’ve bean reading about how to prune lately, so this is particularly cool to see. Which leader did you keep?
Exactly 5 years. However, the tree has remained the same shape for probably the past 2.5 years. It has really responded well to some pretty heavy pruning.
I kept the 2 left ones and cut off that fork at the bottom about 3 years ago About a year later, I then removed the far left trunk to create a single trunk.
Great pruning job! I assume that ‘Anna’ ripens in the June-July window, when does the second harvest come in and is it significant?
Second harvest is usually a few months later, maybe in September/October. I get about half of the apples from the first round. Amazingly, there is usually another round of apples after that but those usually never mature or grow fully.
This is so cool!!! (even though I feel like a total dunce though…) I have 13 apple trees but literally had NO idea there was even such a thing as apple trees out there that cropped multiple times in a single season!!
So I went over to the Orange Pippin site to read some reviews and one poster said they get 3-4 crops a season!
Learn something every day.
Nice job on the pruning too!
The tree looks very nice now! Have you experienced it to be a ‘low vigor’ variety as I have seen it described elsewhere on here? And what is your care regimen? Lastly do you have another apple tree or is yours self pollinating? I spied an Anna at the hardware store last week that looks very good and am sorely tempted to try growing one, albeit in a large pot. Seems if I’m to try growing any in this no chill climate then Anna and/or Golden Dorsett would be my best bets.
The tree is pretty vigorous. I prune pretty heavily to get it to the shape I want and to open up the center a little. It is self pollinating and bears heavily, although I did graft several other apples to it a few months ago. It is pretty low maintenance. I don’t really do anything to it besides watering and pruning. I don’t really fertilize because it has never shown any kind of deficiency or vigor.
I’ve read and been told that chill is not a huge factor with apples. I’ve grafted 5 or 6 different apples onto the tree that are high chill to see how they will bear. They put on a lot of growth this year and I am hoping for them to fruit next year.
My apple tree was originally in a large wine barrel pot from the previous owner and it looked terrible. Once I planted it in the ground, it took off.
That is a happy looking tree you have there…I’m envious…
I’m on my 4th Anna apple…The third one I bought turned out to have fire blight so I just planted another this past weekend…fingers crossed.
The first photo is pretty typical of what I see when apples in a warm climate are left to themselves. Anna is vigorous and usually responds well to heavy pruning.
This photo below is right on the equator in East Africa, the Anna apples are skinny because there’s no pollinator. They get two crops, one in May and one in November. The November crop is about 30% of the May crop. The dry season is after November, and so that’s probably what keeps the third small crop from forming.
You can see this fellow has trained the tree to central leader and pulled the branches down horizontal, essential in growing apples in a tropic climate. Even in this skinny state, they are quite valuable in the marketplace.
I planted an Anna Apple, didn’t know they got red colored.
Color can vary on them depending on sun exposure. Anna is on the left, Dorset Golden is on the right. This is what they look like when pollinated.
Anna makes killer pies. Shell of Alabama is a better pollinator for Anna, the apples hang on the tree much better than DG.
Very nice
Gorgeous apples.
