Apple tree food plors

[certified jumbo]

So about 20 years ago we started planting Apple trees as wildlife plots.  I read a ton of info on how to' s, best practices,  etc etc.  

I planted about 200 trees.  Roughly half made it to adulthood.  Trees died from many reasons from bears, to moles, infections, etc.  But we have lots of thriving, heavy producing trees. 

Something I found interesting is the trees that I didn't prune have done far better than the trees I did prune.  My question is, is pruning a must or overrated in your opinion.  Just curious your answers..

[delcecchi]

If you want quality apples to eat, every year, pruning is a must.    If you are going to let them fall on the ground so you can shoot the consumers, , that is less clear.  

[Bear55]

I would say your results speak for themselves, we often do things that don't make sense or trade short term gain for long term trouble. Nature does things for a reason that we often don't understand, why try to fix what isn't broken?