When to spray fruit trees.

[Oldcountryboy]

How do you control worms on your fruit trees? What do you spray the trees with, when, and how often?

Most of my fruit trees are either budding out or blossoming right now. One apple tree and one pear tree already have little bitty fruits forming. Would love to have a decent crop of fruits to eat on.

[VOR.]

I do not have trouble with worms on my trees, but I do have other pests. I sprayed a month or so ago with dormant spray and Lime Sulfur spray. I hit my apple and pear trees with copper fungicide a few days ago to control an outbreak of fire blight.

Do not spray any insecticides during the blooming period. It will kill the bees that are pollinating your trees. After the bloom, you can spray with Summer oil. It is a lighter oil than dormant oil. You also should look into a product called Surround or consider using the Red Sticky balls that trap the moths that lay the worm eggs.

[Backfourty,MI.]

I use a spray that's called "Fruit tree spray" bought it at my local mill in town. You don't need very much at a time but again you can't spray when in flowers because it will kill the bee's. You can use it on them when in fruit though to keep the worms off.

[mooman]

I use a fungicide and seven as my insecticide. I spray diligently during the first part of the growing season to control cedar apple rust. I taper off later in the season and only spray when jap beatles reach the point where I catch them fornicating on the tree. My trees have not reached fruiting bearing age yet.

[WisJim]

It depends on what the potential pests or diseases might be. Indiscriminently spraying isn't good, just throwing some generic mixture at the trees because it might help some problem you might have. Do some research, get Mike Phillips book "The Apple Grower." I don't spray anything without having a reason for it--haven't sprayed anything at all for 10+ years and get more apples, pears, plums, cherries, etc., than we can eat (still eating apples from last fall, too). Healthy soil means healthy plants which don't have many problems with insects or disease.