Crab apple pruning

[lekkerkroketje]

I have a little malus gorgeous crab apple, bought online during lockdown. It came with three stems in a chalice shape starting from a few inches above the ground. I think that's how you'd prune a tree for production (e.g. a peach) but for a mostly ornamental tree it doesn't seem the best way. It was bought to add some tannins into any future cidre, but all the apple trees are a long way off that so for now it's just to look pretty!

I could bend one stem to the centre to try to make a main stem/trunk and chop the other two, but it will be a bit knobbly and not straight at the bottom. Or I could try to embrace the chalice and live with a weird bushy tree. Or hopefully some of you gardening genii can propose a better solution!

What would you do to it?

I think I'd leave it with three stems but prune out most of the branches in the middle to make it more open. This stops disease and will make it easier to pick the fruit, also take out any that cross and rub on each other.

Thanks! That's how we treat the other apple trees. The poor little thing got savaged by ants and aphids too, then blasted by the heat wave so it will probably always be a weird stunted little tree.

Ahh poor little crab apple! I bet it still gives you lots of fruit though.