I own acerage that I am planting tree's etc for wildlife management. I recently found some apple trees with small apples/huge crab apples. I would like to start seedlings on a large scale, hundreds. should I try to get them in the ground this fall or should I wait till spring? If spring should I store in freezer or place in moist peat sand mixture in the ground? how deep? When planting should I plant them in rows like corn or should they be in beds. Once they reach 1 year or so I plan on scattering them. Help would be greatly appreciated. thanks mule
Apples seeds require cold stratification to germinate, so planting them out now would work or store the seeds in the moist peat moss in the fridge until ready to plant in the spring. Seeds planted in the spring without the cold period would be very unlikely to germinate. If you have great abundance of seeds, you might want to try planting a bunch where you would have them grow (already distributed around the property.) My guess though is that deer or some other varmint will be a problem. You may have to establish the seedlings in a large bed where you can monitor them and transplant them in the fall or after a few years growth. You may need to protect the young trees for a while either way.
You can plant and grow apples from seed if your desire is to just generate trees, irrespective of the taste of the fruit. Apples are never grown from seed, as seed rarely ever produces a tree with quality fruit. It is estimated to be 1 in 100,000 for an apple seed to eventually produce a fruit that would be worth a commercial quality . - Millet
