How an Apple Grows

Teacher’s Story

An apple tree in full blossom is a beautiful sight. If we try to analyze its beauty we find that on the tip of each twig there is a cluster of blossoms, and set around them, as in a conventional bouquet, are the pale, soft, downy leaves. These leaves and blossoms come from the terminal winter buds, which are protected during winter by little scales which are more or less downy. With the bursting of the bud, these scales fall off, each one leaving its mark crosswise on the twig, marking the end of the year’s growth; these little ridges close together and in groups mark the winters which the twig has experienced, and thus reveal its age.

There is a difference in varieties of apples and in the season as to whether the blossoms or the leaves push out first. The white, downy leaves at first have two narrow stipules at the base of their petioles. They are soft, whitish and fuzzy, as are also the flower stem and the calyx, which holds fast in its slender, pointed lobes the globular flower bud. We speak of the lobes of the calyx because they are joined at the base, and are not entirely separate as are sepals. The basal part of the calyx is cup-shaped, and upon its rim are set the large, oval petals, each narrowing to a slender stem at its base. The petals are set between the sepals or lobes of the calyx, the latter appearing as a beautiful, pale green, five-pointed star at the bottom of the flower. The petals are pink on the outside and white on the inside, and are veined from base to edge like a leaf; they are crumpled more than are the cherry petals.

The many pale, greenish white stamens of different lengths and heights stand up like a column at the center of the flower. They are tipped with pale yellow anthers, and are attached to the rim of the calyx-cup. They are really attached in ten different groups but this is not easy to see.

The five pale green styles are very silky and downy and are tipped with green stigmas. The pistils all unite at their bases making a five-lobed, compound ovary. The upper part of this ovary may be seen above the calyx-cup, but the lower portion is grown fast to it and is hidden within it. The calyx-cup is what develops into the pulp of the apple, and each of these pistils becomes one of the five cells in the apple core. If one of the stigmas does not receive pollen, its ovary will develop no seed; this often makes the apple lop-sided. When the petals first fall, the calyx-lobes are spread wide apart; later they close in toward the center, making a tube. To note exactly the time of this change is important; since the time of spraying for the codling moth is before the calyx-lobes close. These lobes may be seen in any ripe apple as five little, wrinkled scales at the blossom end; within them may be seen the dried and wrinkled stamens, and within the circle of stamens, the sere and blackened styles.

There may be five or six, or even more blossoms developed from one winter bud, and there may be as many leaves encircling them, forming a bouquet at the tip of the twig. However, rarely more than two of these blossoms develop into fruit, and the fruit is much better when only one blossom of the bouquet produces an apple; if a tree bears too many apples it cannot perfect them.

The blossoms and fruit are always at the end of the twigs and spurs of the apple tree, and do not grow along the sides of the branches as do the cherry and the peach. However, there are many buds which produce only leaves; and just at the side and below the spur, where the apple is borne, a bud is developed, which pushes on and continues the growth of the twig, and will in turn be a spur and bear blossoms the following year.