Protecting Your Apples from Insects Organically with Surround and Nylon Stockings

For many years I've been frustrated by the near complete loss of my apple crop to plum curculios, codling moths and apple maggot.  If you're not familiar with these insects pests download this excellent PDF from the Wisconsin extension.  It is free to download and you can purchase a hard copy as well.

Between the three of these little devils, I was getting only enough apples for a few pints of applesauce.  I tried putting nylon stockings over the developing tiny fruit.  However, the plum curculios damage the fruit before it is large enough to be able to use this technique.

This year I finally got smart and I began spraying my apples since petal fall with Surround, a finely ground clay that irritates the insects and prevents them from feeding or injecting their eggs into the fruit.  Here's a good article about using Surround kaolin clay.  (It's probably obvious but "petal fall" is when most of the petals have fallen off the blossoms.)  Don't spray before petal fall or you will interfere with pollination.

The Surround keeps the insects at bay until the fruitlets are the size of a nickel and ready for their nylon stocking hats.  The nylon "footies" protect the apple for the rest of the season.   You can read all about this technique and buy footies from the Home Orchard Society website.

Here's the whole process:

This is what the Surround Kaolin Clay spray looks like when applied.  The silvery color is actually pretty pleasing but does look a little weird.  I hated the way the spray covered my grass and so I avoided using Surround for years.  This year I experimented and found that if I spray the grass immediately after application with a strong jet of water, most of the excess clay is washed away.

Before putting on the footie we need to thin the fruit to prevent the tree from over-taxing itself and to make the apples that remain on the tree bigger.

Using a scissors I carefully thin away the excess fruit.  Choose the largest fruit and do your best to make sure it isn't damaged in any way.

After thinning this apple has room to grow!

Now comes the weird part.  Putting on the nylon footies.

Here's the footie as it comes out of the package.  These stockings do NOT snap back so handle them carefully.

You need to open the footie 1/3 to 1/2 its length.  I  pull the footie over my thumb to coax it open far enough to slip over the tiny apple.

Now gently slide the footie over the small apple.  Insert it about half way.  This  gives plenty of room for the apple to grow.

Now just lightly twist the end shut under the fruitlet.  Be careful not to break him off!

Here's the finished product.  A cute little apple snug inside a nylon footie.  Sure, it looks a little weird but isn't that worth it for perfect organic apples?

There you have it.  Not only is this process completely organic, it also avoids killing the pests.  As a Buddhist, I really appreciate being able to avoid unnecessary killing.  The pests land on the tree, become irritated by the clay, and move on somewhere else!