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Hi - does anyone know why my Tydemans Late Orange apples have scarred skin? The first pic shows it, the second pic is for comparison, it has blemish-free skin (lucky apple!) (click photos to enlarge)

The tree is about 3 years old, first year of fruit, it has I think 5 or 6 apples on it, and only one is unscarred, it's also larger than the tiny scarred fruit.

I'd really appreciate it if anyone knows why this might be and if I can improve the situation.

Thanks!

It looks like scab, but as I haven't had it, I don't know the answer.

could be apple sawfly ???

Thanks for suggestions - I looked up apple sawfly, but images all show it leaves a circular path round the apple, very unusual looking and not the slightly cracked looking skin of these apples.

I wondered whether it was scab, as I had heard of that. And it might well be, but it doesn't look like any of the pictures of apple scab when you google it. That shows round scabs and dark bits.

I suppose it's possible  it's just weathering, and is not a disease at all. But the apple without it is larger than the others, which seem to have stopped growing. Maybe they still have time - it is Tydemans LATE orange after all!

I think there are maybe a couple of problems, looking at the pictures.
There does seem to be indications of stress due to lack of water, or erratic supply of water. This shows on the tips of the leaves, and would explain the cracking of the skins of the apples, and the small size of most of the apples.
At only 3 years old, the root system of your apple tree may not have developed well enough yet to have coped with trying to grow bigger and support fruit at the same time during the dry spell we've had in the south this year.
There also looks to be some damage to the leaves which may be caused by a blister mite.
I would remove the fruit straight away, and water very well (minimum 10 gallons) at least once a week, making sure the water is applied to a wide area around the tree, not close to the trunk, to get to the parts of the root system that will take up the water. You may want to dig a small hole 6 to 12" deep, to see just how moist or dry the soil is at around 3 feet from the trunk of the tree.

Thank you - water stress would certainly make sense. I will remove the apples and luckily it's been raining a lot these last few days, so that should help.

But yes there were many many weeks of no rain, and watering by hand I only watered the tree occasionally. It's on a hill as well, so a lot of water is probably washing down the hill.

I'll give it a bit more TLC and see what happens.

Thanks for the advice!