This is an Oikos ecos selection apple that has a severe rub above my first planned scaffold. The trunk that got rubbed is long because I was growing it tall to bend uphill on the steep site and get other branches above the browse line.
Will the portion above the rub thrive or should I cut it back to the scaffold and select a new leader?
I have a crab apple in my back yard that has suffered nasty rubs 2 times… but the buck basically just rubbed the one side and not all the way around. It is 20+ years old now and doing fine still.
If you have half or more of the bark left … (talking around the circumference of the tree) even if all or most of it was removed from the other half… I bet it will recover. Good Luck !
personally I would just put up some additional deer protection so the other side doesn’t get rubbed too and then wait and see what grows the following spring before pruning anything. thats what I did for my dogwood and it grew back from nodes below the damage and above the graft the next spring.
