The apple crop

TPP has not had the best luck with apples.  Previous attempts to have a few apples have been failures in one way or another. The most recent failure was a dwarf Novaspy, the first time Northern Spy has been successfully dwarfed. Of the two trees planted, both were initially vigouous and one flowered and fruited nicely in its 3d year, but then it went into a decline and died. The 2nd tree stayed vigorous, but it never flowered and fruited and seemed determined to grow into a larger sized tree. The one crop of apples was great, real Northern Spys, a superb variety that is hard to find.  
So try, try again, and two Colonnade apple trees were planted, both the same variety, Flamenco, derived from orange pippin ancestry. These are a columnar dwarf, growing 10-12 feet tall and 3-4 feet in diameter, and the nursery stock was beautiful. However a pollinator was needed and only one variety of Colonnade was available, so an Urban Apple columnar tree was gotten from another vendor. This was a Tart Lime, a granny smith type apple that TPP was not so keen to have, but biology. This tree was half as big and half the price (notice how that works),  but the flowering of these varieties may not work out in terms of flowering time, but no matter as the Colonnade trees did not flower in their 2nd season, while the Urban Apple did. Now crab apples of the ornamental type can pollinate apples if their flower color is similar. And the image above shows the apple crop, the whole apple crop, one apple, on the tree bought as a pollinator.  It's a start.