Today I cut the dead top out of an old apple tree. It had a trunk of 2
feet diameter
but was much bigger because half of the trunk had split and fallen over
some
years ago. And where it had split, was applied some tar. But I cut a
porton of
that trunk away and found to my horror that the trunk was nearly hollow
with
ants and with some large grub insect. Whether these insects were the
cause of
the hollowness, I do not know.

One good news is that the tree is still alive and has new growth all
around.

My question is this. Can such a tree be saved? Is there some insecticide
to
throw into that hollow trunk? Or is it better not waste any time on it
and
plant an new tree nearby in anticipation of its final demise.

One thought occurred to me was to buy gallons of tar patch and just fill

up that trunk hole. But since it did not work before why should it work
now?

I guess what I am asking is whether anyone has had a similar experience
with an old apple tree and has found a clever way of keep it alive much
longer.

I am curious if this old tree will yield any apples this year. And that
would
certainly give me the incentive to find a way to save it as long as
possible.

Finally. I have noticed on apple trees damaged that they seem to find
new
sucker shoots off the old and dying trunk. Sort of like a clone. Sort of
like
elm or locust trees cut down and a new tree comes from the old roots.
So I wonder if some apple trees are say 200 or 300 years old by the
owner
keeping new clones from the dead and dying rest of the tree.

Any thoughts from apple experts?

Archimedes Plutonium,
whole entire Universe is just one big atom where dots
of the electron-dot-cloud are galaxies