I also finally euthanized the Frostbite tree i posted about in 2019. Awful graft from cummins. Just kept declining no matter what i tried. Sad bc i really wanted it.
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Did you save scionwood of Frostbite. It is a good but small apple.
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I missed my windowā¹ļø. In feb when i looked to grab some wood it was pretty much dead twigs. Should have grabbed some earlier and just redone the graft.
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My Frostbite graft was removed because it happened to be on the branch that was in my way. I donāt feel too bad. I still have plenty of apples I like.
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I found Hunt quite chewy, even after storing in the fridge a while. But so worth it! The high Brix (18 & 19) and tart balance kept me hoping for more. In less desert conditions I think Hunt could be the secret weapon to making world class cider.
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I may look for some wood next spring and graft into my macintosh. Is it a good apple? I like small and sweet
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I cut down an American Beauty apple tree that got hit hard with blight. Sad to see it go, but the good news is that the rootstock is sending up some shoots, so I should be able to graft something new in its place down the line.
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To me, Frostbite is a good apple. I am not not good describing taste but it is nice balanced taste. I could not call it a āsweetā apple. If you like sweet apples, Check out Orin and, of course, Fuji.
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Thanks for the info 
i MIGHT have room for one more tree once i pull methley.
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As we keep repeating here, everything is location dependentā¦
A classmate of mine from college is the horticulturist for a large orchard in Virginia. Theyāre just starting to remove peach blocks that were planted in the early 90s (that had me scratching my head too. A peach tree in production for 30 years, sounds like they struck that one lucky)
I used to work at an orchard that has a peach block that was planted in the late 90sā¦(I worked there 2010-2013)ā¦the orchard manager never used to fertilized and the trees while they still bore fruit looked said.
Low and behold the orchard managerās been applying calcium nitrate for the last 9 years straightā¦now he complains that the 24 year old trees grow too much. Another head scratcher
Iāve never grown Autumnstarā¦Iām not sure how finicky it is nor do I know what your areaās like. Maybe that variety just has a short life expectancy in your area.
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Iām curious what part of Virginia?
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Piney River.
The place is called Saunders Bros.
https://www.saundersbrothers.com/
Iāve talked to Marshall Saunders a couple times over the years at the growerās convention in Hershey.
Heās a good guy and started a bare root nursery in addition to the 158,672 other things that Saunders doesā¦heās good at growing bare root apple treesā¦I ordered Fairtime, Sunhigh and Spring Snow treesā¦Marshall was very embarrassed about the low success rate of his peach grafts and the size of the 1 year growth of the trees to the point where heās stopped selling peach trees to other growersā¦the last time I talked to Jason (my classmate from college) I said, āMarshall should feel better about himself, the trees are very healthy and doing very well despite my orchard conditions being challenging (the soilās very acidic and the areas been very dry recently) so kinda pat Marhsall on the back and tell him he has an excellent product.ā
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Itās time for me to remove more trees. The more experience I get raising trees both at home at at rentals, the more I see how much easier things are when I can space them 10+ feet apart. Lots of the trees at home are still 5ā in-row spaced.
One kind of tree that continues to be problematic for me are Euro plum. Even the ones at 7-8ā spacing seem to overgrow their area and produce very little.
@scottfsmith, what shape proved most productive for you? Can Euro plums be productive as central leader spindles, or should they be more spreading vases? If so, do they need 10+ feet minimum? Iāve been moving toward giving peaches as much space as I can and trying to prune them into a single flat layer of branches around 5-7ā high. It seems to work, but takes a lot of space. Of course, what Iām doing now for Euro plums doesnāt really produce much, so any space spent on them is currently wasted.
I recently found a single fruit on the āLate Muscatelleā which was great. 23 brix, lots of flavor. After that, I had a Stanley from the farmers market and actually spit it outā¦9 brix for a Euro plum isnāt palatable. Iād just like to be able to get more than 1 fruit per tree 
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I will be removing 2 Honeycrisp trees ( horrible looking leaves and a non productive apple tree 10 years), Parmer apple ( hardly any production in 9 years), 2 of my G series apple trees( G 202 & G11/M111 interstem - 10 years)- horrible small trees, little growth and spindly looking. I may try over grafting the one Honeycrisp. The trunk seems big enough to do that to. I am looking at taking out my Wynoochee Early apple tree. I had high hopes for that apple- no fruit ( 6 years)- thin trunk.
The rest the trunks are so spindly. They look like they are about 4 years old.
I gave them plenty of time to produce fruit. They have not done that so now it is time to replace them with something that will actually produce fruit.
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Iām in the process of removing 3 Lychee trees, they didnāt produce anything for 8 years.
I also will remove one HoneyCrisp apple, I have 3 out there, I will graft it to my other 3 very productive low chill apple trees. In its place I will plant my Hood pear. Yeah, I finally get a European pear for a change.
One fig tree Black Jack will be donated to my daughterās business partner. In its place I will plant Bassā Favorite Fig.
I also chopped down two avocado trees in container, they barely produced any fruit, they need a lot of water so thatās a good reason to get rid of them. My brother refused to take them, he also has no water.
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Have top worked many pears this year to what i think will be much better varities.
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Let me know if anyone is within driving distance and wants to dig any of these out this winter.
Iāve got about 10-11 mini-dwarf apples on G65 which will be going. Iāll probably put blackberries in their place. They just havenāt grown very large or been that productive and they are in a part of the yard where it isnāt very convenient to baby them. They are mostly 4-5ā tall, after being planted as rootstocks in 2013.
Itās hard for me to ID them all at this point, but there are some interesting ones in there: Sweet Bough, Rein Des Reinette, Leomen, Suntan, Holstein, etc.
I may have 1-2 larger sized apples to remove as well (maybe a Sundance on G11 and a American Mother on a similar stock). Just too close to other treesā¦
A couple pears on quince (Harvest Queen + some grafts, and Beurre Fouqueray). I have a few other pears which are better spaced that I will probably cut back hard. Iām not thrilled with Euro pears- they seem hard to figure out when they are ripe, sometimes needing to sit in storage for a while and my family doesnāt like them that much so Iād be the only one to eat a few. No need for a dozen big Euro pear treesā¦Maybe Iāll graft a few over to Asian pears which everyone in the family likes.
Iāve got at least one kiwi to remove- it is smothering a sour cherry tree and isnāt really needed. It is a multi-graft of a male plus Cordifolia. My brother needs a male for pollination, so heās interested in it, but he may change his mind when he sees how big it is.
I think this is Kenās Redās last chance. It actually has a bit of fruit on it this year (planted in 2011 and Iāve had less than a handful of fruit). If it doesnāt blow me away with quality, Iām going to reclaim the space. The Issai may also be going as well, or at least massively cut back. Looking at the amount of fruit on just the trellis in the back (Cordifolia, Jumbo, and Rossana), I have no idea how Iāll use it all. There could be 100lbs on the Rossana and 50lbs each on the other two. Iām not sure I need more than 10 pounds of kiwiā¦I wonder if I should thin it- is that something people even do with kiwi?
All the thorny boysenberry around the yard are gone. I like the jam from them, but dealing with thorny vines is a pain I can do without. Same for Prime Jan. Primocane blackberries are neat in that they ripen at a time when no other blackberries are around, so they are nice for foraging. But I donāt want to deal with any thorns. At least nothing bigger than the stubble that red raspberries have. They arenāt thorny, but Iāll probably have a lot of Triple Crown to give away as well, given how they keep spreading on their own.
Iāve got ~5 currants (black, red, and pink) on the chopping block because after about 10 years they have just been overgrown with weeds and become harder to manage. Better to clean up a few each year. I may end up replanting some of them. Or just giving them away. I should have a lot to give away, as a single bush can be split up into quite a few sections. Maybe 5+ per bush.
I may also get rid of a Heath Cling. Not because I donāt like HC, but because I have several of this tree and/or its seedling at a couple rentals. All of which produce better than the tree at my house, which suffers from lots of rot due to the tight spacing. Big peaches (8+ years old) probably wonāt transplant that well. so I may just remove it. Though I should check to see what grafts I may want to save.
Iāve heard the rule of thumb is that Honeycrisp grows as if the rootstock was one class smaller. So, semi-dwarf grows like dwarf, dwarf grows like mini-dwarf, etc. I made the mistake of planting it on mini-dwarf (M27), so after a decade it is 4-5ā tall, though it did make 7-8 apples this year. My oldest really likes Honeycrisp so I will probably graft it to a stronger tree this winter.
Edit: hereās a pic of my backyard, showing how full things can getā¦
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I think anyone who has grown perennials for a number of years has figured out if it isnāt working out, take it out.
On my 150ā x 75ā residential lot, there is only one plant / tree that I didnāt plant and/or remove. Itās a 70 foot tall 28 year old oak tree (straight trunk type).
Some no longer fit the space, some from disease, some from my own apathy. Some to try a newer variety. Some because I planted them in the wrong spot. Etc.
I get over any sadness at watching something go with a few new projects to work on and look forward to. At least for new things I can naively think they will work out perfectly.
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Scott, hi! Do you think its the humidity along with in insects that really interfere with your growing of euro plums. The list of problems you mentioned, does not exist here. I had your same problems in RI. They are great tasting plums. 
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I see you are about an hour from me as I head toward Vesuvius. I went on line and I see several orchards and cider breweries out your way. Saunders orchard must be enormous.
Any relationship between Piney Fork LT and your neck of the woods?
Could you see the big fire on the mountain in Vesuvius several years ago? The site says it was 2018 but it doesnāt seem like that much time has passed.
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