What's wrong with my apples? Help!

[SunnyUpNorth]

I would really appreciate the advice of all you gardening gurus.

We moved into a house with a large overgrown garden earlier this year. I know nothing at all about gardening and have just been trying to gradually weed etc.

The only thing I was excited about was the apple tree. This has finally started growing apples but they are all covered in small, brown blemishes and cracks.

Is this some kind of disease? I am assuming its too late to rectify this year but can I do anything about it for next year or is it beyond saving?

Am gutted that I will have to spend the autumn picking up rotten apples without being able to enjoy eating any.

Its probably Apple Scab.

You can still eat the fruit so long as they are not to bad. This tree has probably been neglected for a while so it mostly needs a bit of TLC.

The way to deal with it is pick up all the fruit as it falls off and remove all dead leaves under the tree in the Autumn. Its fallen fruit and leaves that harbour the fungus. In fact picking up fruit and removing dead leaves and not leaving them to rot under the tree solves a lot of fungal and insect borne problems in general.

Finally, give the tree a really good pruning back to make a nice smaller ball shaped tree and put some manure round it in the Autumn and leave over winter.

Thanks morebeta that's really helpful.