Every gardener wants to enjoy not only the healthy appearance of his “wards”, but also their fragrant fruits. But it was not there. That's really that year, the favorite apple tree refuses to please you with delicious apples.
Why the apple tree does not bear fruit and what to do in such a situation? To eliminate the problem of infertility of fruit trees, first of all, you need to correctly diagnose the cause. In this article we will show you how to help your darling and eliminate the problem of her infertility.
Fertility and age
The time of yield of an apple tree depends on many subjective factors: tree varieties, proper planting and care, soil type, pollination level, quality of seedlings, rootstocks, etc. Therefore, it is impossible to calculate with accuracy what year the apple tree will start to bear fruit. 
Most varieties of apple trees begin to bear fruit on the 6-8th year after planting. Gardeners often try to speed up this process with the help of special dressings and methods.
One of these methods is grafting of varietal cuttings on dwarf rootstocks. As a result of this activity, you can feast on apples as early as the 2nd year after planting. But keep in mind that the growth of the tree will become dull, it will become sluggish, and the yield will decrease every year.
The fact is that each tree has its own phases of fruiting and growth. Perhaps your apple tree is barren because it is still in the active growth phase or entering into a full-time fruiting period. Observe the inside of the crown of the tree: if fouling wood appeared on it and the ovary is either completely absent or is solitary, then the growing period ends and you can soon wait for the harvest.
Did you know? From an apple tree of medium height, you can collect about 20 boxes of apples.
Varietal characteristics
It is the varietal characteristics that often determine the time when the apple tree begins to bear fruit. If early-ripening (summer or autumn) species of fruit trees grow in your garden, they will begin to bear fruit somewhere in the 4th year after planting. Varieties of winter varieties will please you with a harvest only for the 7-8th year of their life activity.
Apple trees, grafted on dwarf rootstocks, or column varieties, will thank you with fragrant fruit already in the 2nd year. 
The average time of onset of fruiting apples is 8-10 years after planting.
Often there are cases when the tree gave one crop, and this is where its fertility was dulled or ended altogether. Do not immediately take drastic measures and get rid of such a tree. Experienced gardeners claim: how many times an apple tree bears fruit in life is directly proportional to the place where it grows, the type of soil, compliance with the rules of planting and care, and, of course, the variety.
Summer and autumn varieties often produce high-quality crops for 20 years or more, while some actively reduce yields after 15 years of fruiting. Winter varieties can please you with fragrant apples 30 years in a row. 
Did you know? In America, growing long-lived apple tree, planted back in 1647. It’s hard to believe, but the tree still bears fruit.The number of apples depends on their size: the larger the apples, the less they will be able to "carry" the tree.
In case the tree, irrespective of a grade, fructifies periodically, it is worth strengthening care of it. In this situation, everything depends on the gardener. The correct diet of feeding, pruning branches, watering, caring for and care for the ovaries - the application of such efforts will be rewarded with a generous harvest.
Many ovaries
Many ovaries - this is one of the main reasons that provokes the frequency of apple fruit, because it prevents the budding of flower buds for the next year. In addition, a large number of ovaries drains the tree. Therefore, do not be too happy if your apple tree is completely covered with color. 
Any experienced gardener will assure you that excessive amounts of ovaries need to get rid of. You can resort to this both manually and chemically.
The main thing in the process of getting rid of excessive ovaries is not to harm the central flower and not to provoke damage to the whole inflorescence.
Manual thinning of the ovaries consists in cutting off the lateral flowers of the inflorescence in the first or second half of June, depending on the variety. The stem of the flower should be left to not harm the inflorescence. At the right time she will fall away. 
Chemical thinning of the ovaries is carried out using the recommended chemicals (ammonium thiosulfate, urea, etc.) in the proportions indicated in the instructions. This method should be applied after the dusting of the central flower of the inflorescence, which occurs on the 3-4th day of flowering. The side flowers are sprayed with a chemical that either burns them or prevents dusting.
Important! The chemical method of thinning the ovaries is quite risky. And it's not even the correctness of the calculation of proportions. In the case of the onset of freezing after chemical treatment, you personally deprive yourself of the harvest.
No pollinator variety
One of the main prerequisites for obtaining a good harvest of fruit trees is the presence of pollinator varieties. The fact is that the flowers themselves are practically barren, they need pollen to be fruitful. There are, of course, self-fruited fruits, but the apple tree does not belong to such.
Even at the stage of laying the garden you need to combine what varieties of fruit and where to plant in order to avoid under-pollination. Optimal cross-pollination occurs when there are 3-4 types of trees of the same species. 
Did you know? Apples, it turns out, do not sink in water. The secret is that состава of their composition - it's air.The apple pollinator variety is a tree that should grow no further than 50-60 m in order for the bees to carry the pollen unhindered. The flowering time of such a tree, the formation of pollen on it, the ripening period should coincide with the one it pollinates. Therefore, it is recommended to avoid randomness of planting varieties with different periods of fruiting: early varieties are advised to plant near the early ones, late ones - near the late ones.
Choosing the best pollinators also depends on the variety. For example, “Antonovka” will suit “Papirovka”, “Rennet” - “Pepin of London”, “Makentoshu” - “Antonovka”, “White filling” - “Suislepskoe”, etc.
Familiarize yourself with the cultivation of other varieties of apple trees: "Glory to the winners", "Rozhdestvenskoe", "Ural bulk", "Krasa Sverdlovsk", "Orlinka", "Zvezdochka", "Ekrannoe", "Antey", "Uralets", "Champion" , "Sunny", "Candy", "Melba".
Bad place
Apple tree - picky tree. But, like everyone, she has her whims. She does not like excess moisture, so they do not recommend planting this type of fruit in the marshlands. It is also necessary to take into account the level of groundwater occurrence: optimum - 1.8 m with mobile waters, 2-2.5 m - with stagnant ones. 
The terrain on which thawing and rainwater linger for a long time is also not suitable for planting apple trees, since its root system may die from excess moisture. The best soil for growing apple trees is loamy and sandy. Stony ground, crushed stone or sand are harmful to the full activity of fruit plants.
Apple orchard should be protected from the cold northern winds and provided with a high level of illumination. Did you know? Apple orchards occupy 5 million hectares of the surface of our planet. Every second tree on earth is an apple tree.
Damage to young branches
Both man and animals, and nature itself is capable of harming the young branches of the apple tree.
Improper cutting of branches can seriously hurt a tree, for some time, deplete it and even lead to death. Often, the apple tree suffers from uninvited guests - hares and rodents, who are not averse to eat its bark and young branches.
In this case, you need to take first aid measures - you need to treat her wounds. To do this, use antiseptics (heteroauxin, copper sulfate), garden pitch, a mixture of liquid cow manure and clay, which prevent the spread of infection.
In nature, there are many diseases of trees, among which there is even cancer. The gardener's main task is to correctly diagnose the disease and start treatment on time.
Insufficient pruning
Another reason why the apple tree does not bloom and does not bear fruit is a violation of the agrotechnical method of pruning branches and crowns. It is the correctness of this process that regulates the quality of fruitfulness, growth, health and development of the tree. 
Tree pruning is carried out in spring. Omission of this process leads to thickening of the crown, which is fraught with many problems.
Thick crown is a hotbed for pests of leaves and bark of the apple tree, as well as moisture storage, which provokes debate of the leaves and the emergence of many fungal infections that are harmful both to the tree itself and to its fruits.
An under-cropped crown entails immature and tasteless fruits. The fact is that fruits do not get the amount of sunlight needed to ripen. As a result of this oversight, the yield of the plant will decrease every year. 
Neglect of the crown trimming procedure is fraught with other unpleasant surprises. For example, thick branches will not allow rotten fruits to fall to the ground. Apples will remain on the tree and accumulate a lot of infections that can spread to well-groomed plants.
Important! Preventive pruning of the crown should be carried out annually in late autumn or early spring. This should be done delicately, so as not to cause deep wounds to the tree and not to leave stumps.
Pests
Excessive damage to the apple can cause various pests that affect both the tree and its fruits. Therefore, monitor the appearance and condition of your "ward." The most common enemies of the apple tree are:
- Crayfish. It affects the branches and bark of the tree, leads to the death of foci of infection.
- Mite. It causes great harm to the leaves and bark. The disease is recognized by the silvery shade of foliage.
- Bark beetle. It feels bark and foliage of the tree, gnaws out the moves, which provokes the drying and death of the damaged parts.
- Silkworm. A seemingly harmless butterfly at first glance is one of the main enemies of young plants.
- Scab - a fungus that damages the shoots, branches, leaves, flowers and fruits of fruit trees.
- Apple Mole - leaf shredder.
- Flowerbird - a beetle that feeds on the buds and flowers of a fruit plant.
- Aphid - one of the most insidious enemies of trees, envelops their "skeleton" with honeydew, which prevents the development, growth and fruiting.
Mineral oversupply
Moderation is the main principle of gardening. Often, the apple orchard signals an oversupply of minerals, and the gardener continues to feed trees and provoke an overdose. 
Watch your garden carefully - signs of overdose with minerals are easy to recognize:
- yellow leaves indicate an excess of phosphorus;
- dark green foliage - a signal of overdose with nitrogen;
- light leaves, slow growth of trees, a lot of dead parts suggests that you overfed the apple tree with potassium;
- an excess of boron and copper provokes yellowing and premature abscission of leaves, their folding;
- excessive zinc repaints streaks on leaves in red or black color;
- the appearance of purple-white spots on the foliage - a signal of an overdose of chlorine;
- an excess of iron is fraught with yellowing and blanching of the foliage.
Important!Apple's glut of minerals is not always the result of improperly calculating supplements. It is worth remembering that the soil itself is rich in nutrients.
Arrangement of branches
The yield of apples directly depends on the type of arrangement of the branches: horizontally growing branches - a pledge of high fruiting, vertical and aspiring upwards - are not able to please a high-quality harvest.
You have concluded that it is because of the location of the branches that the apple tree does not bear fruit. What to do in this case? Bend down vertically growing branches and shoots in a horizontal direction using a cuff made of dense material. Tie the necessary branch to the peg forgotten in the ground from the side you need. 
Throughout the summer, bend the branch little by little in a horizontal direction and leave it in that position for the winter, and in spring you can safely untie the already horizontal branch. Young shoots that germinate on it, either reject too, or delete.
Many people think that an apple tree is a tree that grows on its own, and often complain about its “fruitlessness”. But in order to feast on fragrant juicy apples, it is not enough just to plant an apple tree. She still needs to be looked after. Only joint efforts of a tree and a man will give the expected result.
