This whole thread seems much ado about nothing. EVERY seedling apple tree
produces edible fruit - the problem is that most seedlings will produce
fruit that is too sour for most people's taste. A lot of sugar will turn
those apples into delicious apple pies, apple sauce, apple butter, or can be
mixed with other types of apples to make a great cider. There's a wild park
area in my town. There are quite a few seedling apple trees there. Russian
families go there in the fall and gather the fruit for something. (Homemade
vodka?) Having tasted a lot of those apples, I can tell you definitively,
they are not choice varieties......LOL Now, if most apple seedlings produced
poisonous fruit, with only a few select kinds being non-poisonous, that
would be a different situation entirely. However, if a person has a small
yard, a questionable apple tree seems a waste of space. Apples are not my
personal favorites as trees OR as fruit, but to each his own - and every
tree has beautiful fragrant flowers for 2 weeks or so in the spring, so that
counts as something.