To Transplant or Let Be?

I heard the advice "The best time to plant a tree is 5 years ago. The second best time is now." And got up and bought two apple trees from a local home and garden center and planted them beside each other.

The result (after another tree purchase later) is a row of Persimmon, Citrus, Citrus (plus three palms, a tea plant and some nandinas), Apple, Apple, and an Apricot. In that order. I also have some thornless blackberries in the spaces around the apples.

I later heard that for disease and pest resilience it's best to not plant the same species directly adjacent to each other, especially where the leaves can touch. Woops.

The apple trees are now about 2 and a half years old and the highest leader is about 2.5 meters tall, the trunk is only a little thicker than my thumb though.

I am considering whether to move one apple to the other side of the apricot - I think I have just enough room. Or just leave it be and plant something else there instead.

As it is I don't have any nitrogen fixing trees or shrubs. I could plant bayberry or sago palm easily, or something else if I did some more research.

The persimmons have few disease and insect problems.  No experience in citrus but the others will take more effort to control these problems.  The fact they are touching can be controlled through pruning.  Summer pruning is ok.  Suggest getting goumi as a nitrogen fixer and also because it has nice fruit.

What a lovely selection of fruit trees Johnson! I am a little jealous.
Moving the tree will certainly mean it needs to reestablish, and could potentially damage it which could introduce diseases to the tree. Unless there are other factors (You think they may be too close for good growth, it isn't doing well where it is, you want to put something else there, or put a path or bench..) I'd be inclined to leave it be.

If they are doing fine, I would leave them alone.

The 2 apples together is probably better for pollination.  If neither has shown that it came with a disease I would not be too concerned.

I can't say they look perfectly healthy... But I have zero experience with apple trees. The leaves had some spots and there are occasionally accumulations of wooly aphids trying to drink the sap. I guess from a beginners perspective they're... Well they're still growing!

are the spots cedar apple rust? lots of pictures online on what it looks like.

In that case practice good sanitation. Clean up fallen leaves.  Spraying with diluted urine, compost or worm tea can improve the immune response and confuse pests.  Spraying when the petals fall works best for my climate.

Good question about cedar apple rust. Maybe?

These are all on my fuji








And this is one from my tsugaru, most of the tsugaru leaves have fallen now for winter.

I've heard the opposite about fruit tree spacing! I've seen some great advice, that if you have limited space, you can plant your fruit trees of different varieties of the same species in tight clumps with good spacing outside the clump. The clump will grow faster than a single multi-grafted tree, and will pollinate each other.

The trees will naturally grow out from and around each other as forest trees do. Just prune any branches that actually rub against each other. As they grow bigger, if you find that one is too dominant and crowding the others out, and if you don't like that, you can prune it back.

Yes this looks like Cedar Apple Rust.   Caused by a cedar or juniper gaul nearby.
Unsure of what is affecting the Tsugaru.