Hi John,

This is an issue that has been debated before on Garden Web, and to my knowledge no one has provided an official answer. Permethrin is permitted after petal fall on pears and on peaches and on a wide range of vegetables, so the prohibition on post-petal-fall application to apples surely is not based on the dangers of eating sprayed fruit. The most likely reason I've seen mentioned is that permethrin can lead to mite flare ups, since it kills beneficial predators. Whatever the reason, it seems that it has to be specific in some way to apples.

austransplant - I've heard that mite theory, too. It seems to be the only explanation.

Hmmm.....never had a mite flareup. I'm glad it isn't a problem with fruit development or safety of the crop then. I'm looking at a one-time application. The tree is a summer rambo with gold and red delicious graft branches for pollination, by the way. Have a few more trees and grafts 1~3 years old.
Will post results .
Thanks!

Thanks Austransplant and Itilton!
Permethin did the trick on the caterpillars, Surrounding woods has plenty of fat ones, though. Have a few codling moth damaged fruit I am removing, and a nice even june drop helping me thin, also. Should be posting some nice harvest pics next month. Also successfully added a goldrush scion,to that tree, but the Albermarle pippin graft hasn't taken yet. I have new whips of both those varieties going, and added one of them ( son removed labels, don't know which lived lol...)to a 3 year old johnathan. .