Two sides to every story

My First Tropical Anna Apple

I grew my first apple – it is a Tropical Anna, and here in Sydney town it was ripe on Christmas Eve.

That’s for anyone else desperately trying to work out ripening times by searching Google like I was. There is actually another apple on the tree – possibly the largest apple I have ever seen- and it’s probably still a few days away.

This is the first year for the tree – I planted it about 12 months ago. It’s pollinating partner, the Tropical Golden Dorset was a bit younger, and it failed to fruit this year.

I ate this lovely specimen straight after picking, and it was so sweet – still slightly warm from the sunlight, and I can’t remember ever eating a better one.

Bug damage to the Tropical Anna

Unfortunately there is another side to this story, and it ain’t attractive. Thankfully it was easily cut away, and didn’t seem to affect the taste of the remaining flesh.

The apple still on the tree looks like it has succumbed to the same fate – only slightly, and only in the last couple of days. I suspect fruit fly, but I have no idea what I’m looking for.

I thought I’d refrain from preventing anything pest-wise this year, just to see what I’m dealing with for future, so now I know that the fruit is susceptible when close to ripe, and I’ll probably need to bag it next year.