An orchard rewards a bit of forward planning more than almost any other patch of ground. Once the trees are in, the work is rarely heavy — but it is seasonal, and jobs missed in one month can cost you a whole crop the next. A simple wall chart, marked up with your own varieties and dates, turns scattered advice into a rhythm you can actually follow.

Why a Wall Chart Beats a Memory

Buy a sheet of A2 card, rule it into twelve columns and pin it up in the shed where you keep your tools. A pencil is better than a pen, because you will amend it every year. Before you write a single task, record the facts you will forget by next spring.

• The variety, rootstock and planting date of every tree
• Which trees flower together, and which act as pollinators
• First blossom date and harvest date for each variety
• Any scab, canker or pest trouble, with the month it appeared

Within two or three seasons the chart becomes a record of your own microclimate. A village ten miles away may run a fortnight behind you; your chart will tell you what is true in your garden.

Late Winter: Pruning and Planting

December to early March is the quiet, structural season. Prune apples on a dry, still day when the wood is not frozen — a spell of hard frost is best avoided, and try to finish before the sap rises. Start by taking out dead, diseased and crossing branches, then step back and look before cutting anything else.

Spur-bearers such as Cox's Orange Pippin and Egremont Russet crop on short spurs along older wood, so shorten the previous year's growth to encourage them. Tip-bearers like Bramley and Discovery carry much of their fruit at the ends of young shoots, so leave those tips alone or you will prune away the crop. Aim for an open centre you could post a hat through.

Bare-root trees go in between November and March, whenever the soil is workable. Plant on MM106 for a medium tree, M25 for a vigorous standard in grass. Stake, mulch, and fit a rabbit guard. January is also wassail month — a good excuse to gather friends round the largest tree with a mug of something warm.

Spring: Blossom, Feeding and Thinning

As the buds break, scatter a handful of sulphate of potash per mature tree and top-dress with well-rotted manure, keeping it clear of the trunk. Go easy on nitrogen: too much leaf and you will get lovely green trees and very few apples.

Frost is the great thief of spring. If a cold night is forecast while trees are in bloom, drape fleece over trained forms and small bushes. Once the June drop has finished, thin the clusters by hand — one apple per cluster, roughly 10–15cm apart. It feels brutal, but the fruit left behind will be larger, better coloured and far less likely to break branches.

Hang codling moth traps in late May and check them weekly. A grease band fitted in autumn will already be catching the wingless females climbing the trunk.

Summer: Water, Pests and the First Picking

Young trees need water in their first three summers: roughly 20 litres a week in dry spells, poured slowly so it soaks rather than runs off. Mature trees in grass will mostly fend for themselves, though a prolonged drought will cost you size.

Watch for woolly aphid in the branch crotches and rub it out with a gloved finger before it spreads. Early varieties such as Discovery and Beauty of Bath ripen from late July. Pick them the moment they lift easily with a cupped hand and a gentle twist.

Autumn: Harvest and the Cider Press

For later varieties, judge ripeness by the pips — brown, not white — and by the colour of the skin. Pick in dry weather, handle the fruit like eggs, and set aside only perfect specimens for storage.

Cider making comes next, and this is where a small orchard earns its keep. Cider apples are grouped as bittersharp and bittersweet; classic English names include Kingston Black, Dabinett, Yarlington Mill and Ellis Bitter. A blend of two or three usually beats a single variety.

• Roughly 30kg of apples gives you about 20 litres of juice
• Scabby fruit is fine; mouldy or rotten fruit is not
• Ferment cool, around 15–18°C, with an airlock fitted
• Rack off the lees after a fortnight and top up the airlock

Let the cider finish dry, then bottle in swing-tops and keep them somewhere cool.

Winter Storage and Next Year's Notes

Store apples in slatted trays or single layers wrapped in newspaper, in a dark, frost-free place at 2–4°C with high humidity. Check them weekly — one rotten fruit taints the whole tray. Bramley will hold until March; Ashmead's Kernel is at its best from Christmas onwards.

Finally, sit down with the chart and a mug of tea. Note what cropped well, what the wasps took, and which tree deserves replacing. That single hour in January is what makes the following year easier.