I make money growing apples but not enough compared to blackberries, blueberries or peaches. My neighbor has about 20 hives of bees which helps with the pollination.
My apple situation is kind of like buying stock in a company that you expect to do well that declines. You can hold on to the stock and hope things improve or you can sell the stock and move on. I’m moving on to blackberries, blueberries and peaches.
The spray recommendations for control of bitter rot in a wet season were developed at the research farm in the Hendersonville area. A fungicide cocktail composed of multiple chemicals sprayed 3 to 5 days during wet weather is the current recommendation. I’m not willing to spray every 5 days in order to produce commercial quality fruit. Modern fungicides are very expensive and I spend more money on chemicals for apples than for blueberries, blackberries and peaches combined.
Apples are so easy to buy at the supermarket now days and they are varieties that are good. I have yet to buy a stone fruit at Walmart that tasted even close to tree ripe fruit. I don’t buy blackberries but do occasionally buy raspberries, they also are bland and tasteless at the grocery store. Tree ripe stone fruit is something you can grow or drive to an orchard and buy.
I don’t have any rare varieties just the normal stuff - some commercial varieties and some heritage varieties. Never tried Honeyberries. Are they good?
Honeyberries are a type of bush honeysuckle native to zone 3 and 4 I think…maybe 5.
But, they do pretty good in Kentucky…and the later varieties are still ripening when blueberries are starting…but earlier ones they say are as much as a month earlier.
They taste somewhat like a blueberry, and if they are really ripe, then like the blueberries had a little honey dizzled on them.
So far harvest is small…but the University of Saskatchewan says they produce up to 20 pounds per bush I believe.
They don’t need low pH soil…and once established, don’t need watering under normal conditions.