I have two crabapples in my front yard and two apples in my back yard, and I haven't noticed any hanky panky!

Really, I don't think anything like that can happen. I'm pretty sure a tree is going to produce its own kind of fruit, no matter what other pollinators are around. I know some cherries require pollination by a different kind of cherry, but it doesn't actually change the kind of fruit they produce; for example, my Lapins cherries are going to produce Lapins cherry fruit, even if they get pollinated by a Bing cherry.

Hi TM,

If one of your trees produces "random branches on the crabapple with Âapple-sized fruits," I wanna see a picture!

You have a whole lot of company wondering about your question! I donÂt know if regular apples cross with crabapples or not, but even if they are hanky pankying, itÂs not gonna make any difference in the fruit you see on either tree. The ONLY thing thatÂs affected by cross pollination is the seed thatÂs produced by the cross. So if you want to see if your trees are crossing, youÂd need to start some seed and grow them up big enough to produce fruit to see what you get. But I really kinda doubt that theyÂd cross anyway.

When I sold plants, I quite often would have people come in and tell me that their plant had crossed pollinated and "changed color." What I usually couldnÂt convince them was that their original plant had died and a seedling had come up in its place. When they kept insisting it was their original plant with different color flowers, IÂd just give up and let them believe what they wanted to. There are more miracle plants in the world than youÂd believe. And there are miracle roses too! People would also come in and tell me their rose had crossed, and that it had different color flowers than when they bought it. What was happening then was that they had a grafted rose, and the grafted part of the plant had died and what they had blooming was suckers that had grown up from the rootstock. But I couldnÂt usually convince people of that either, and they left believing their rose had "cross pollinated."

So donÂt feel bad about asking! I bet youÂll at least listen to the answer!

HereÂs a kinda interesting blurb from a gardening site where somebody else was asking the same question!

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Can squash varieties cross-pollinate with one another or with pumpkins in the garden?
Yes, and no. Squash varieties can pollinate each other if they are the same species. For example zucchini can cross-pollinate with Jack O' Lantern pumpkins or acorn squash. But butternut does not cross with zucchini. However the cross does not affect the flavor of the squash, cucumber or any number of veggies in the garden. Cross-pollination only affects the resulting vegetable if you are saving seed to replant next year. That's when you get a pumzinni or something to that effect.
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Now, human beings can definitely cross pollinate!

;-)
Skybird

Actually, there's all kinds of hanky panky going on and that's a good thing.

Apples need to be pollinated by a different source, so if you have a single apple tree with no others near enough, you'll never get any apples. But crabapple trees (even flowering crabs) are close enough relatives that they'll pollinate the apple tree and you'll get apples.

However, the apple tree stays an apple tree and the crabapple tree stays a crabapple. No need to worry about francranapple effects.

Not sure what you'd see if you planted seeds from the apples, though.

If you plant the seeds, you get what I've got - plenty of crab apple/apple crosses. Some produce tiny crab apple like apples, but with blooms and leaves that look more like the usual apple tree blooms. Some look like gorgeous deep pink crabs with deep coloured leaves, but with apples that are bigger and sweeter than crabs, but still tarter than eating apples usually are.
Most are still too small (IMHO) to peel, cook and can, but good enough to eat raw. This year I'm going to try and juice them.

Cnetter -- are you Canadian? I've noticed your spelling of colour in some of your posts. My Canadian neighbors, I mean neighbours, have commented a few times on how we Americans make words ugly with our simple spelling. :-)

Heh...I also noticed her spelling but I was assuming she was a Brit. I didn't realize Canadians spell words funny too. ;-D

Ok, thanks gang...fortunately that was a very simple answer. My feeble brain was obviously confused. LOL Skybird...working at a nursery, I'm sure you have heard it all!

I did know about fruit and also nut trees needing pollinators, but does anyone know how close they have to be? I'm thinking not very - I know of no other apple trees in our immediate neighborhood and we just have the one tree so far, but this year it's absolutely loaded! Just curious...

I always thought the trees needed to be pretty close, but we had an apple tree that always had lots of apples, and the only pollinators were crabapples down the street (maybe half a block).