Weather: Sunny most of the day, even warm, rainy at intervals.
Apples are kept in a cold store at 5°C. When opening store - leave open for 2 minutes before entering because of risk of asphyxiation from CO2. It is believed that the gases are emitted by the apples. But in this instance the store has a controlled atmosphere that removes the oxygen.
The earliest apples are Beauty of Bath - usually start picking 3rd week of June. The lastest are Sturmer Pippin which stored lasts Nov - Apr. So you can get apples most of the year except for maybe 2 - 3 months.
Continued practicing apple tree pruning. I finished an Anne Boelen variety yesterday, started on a 2nd one of the same variety - even more powdery mildew on tips. Not a lot of shoots was able to be left in the middle, a lot of the active fruiting at the top. Took down some of the height but not drastically, so apples are not too high to reach. We always try to not cut too hard back as we don't want it to react too much and throw out too much growth (i.e. leaves instead of apples). A third apple tree was the same but even taller - this time I didn't take all the watershoots out even though it was mildew ridden - I cut off the worse of it from the tips - this hopefully will encourage them to branch. Mildew may disappear by itself. All brown rot has to be taken off as they infect further.
Usually try and make a clean cut at the base of a stem, but as the tree was so affected by mildew & Molinia fruticola had to make an exception to the rule and cut at a good bud where possible even if it meant halfway through a stem. Not a lot of big material to be taken off, just thinning and taking off diseased all around.
Using the saw properly - long strokes and slow.
To aid secateur cuts - pull branch lightly away from direction of cutting.