Fruitless

I took this picture last year, just fooling around with different shots in my back yard.

Same tree, this year.

 

No apples.  No apples on most of the apple trees in Michigan.  Reports says Michigan lost 90% of its apple crop to our late winter thaw followed by a freeze.  I never even saw the blossoms - the tender buds died before they were fully open.

 

We have 3 apples trees and a ton of crab trees of different types.  So I did a search.  In my front yard, I found the one and only crabapple of the year:

 

It's not a pretty one, either.  I'm not even sure how it formed - doesn't there have to be cross-pollination with another blossom?  If so, there must have been another blossom, and now at least one more crabapple somewhere in SE Michigan. 

 

We'll feel these repercussions for a year, and not just in higher prices for apples shipped here from someplace where Nature didn't go a bit crazy last February.  The deer and birds munch on crabapples all winter.  I don't know what will replace them.