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The age of apple wood may affect its susceptibility to European canker (Neonectria ditissima). Therefore, a glasshouse experiment was conducted with potted trees of six apple cultivars (‘Braeburn’,‘Scilate’,‘Fuji’,‘Golden Delicious’,‘Jonathan’and ‘Royal Gala’) grafted onto two rootstocks (‘M793’and ‘M9’) to study the effect of 3-, 2-or 1-year-old wood on incidence and disease progression following inoculation with conidia of N. ditissima. Initial analyses of cultivars on ‘M793’showed a significant wood age effect on disease incidence and lesion length, which was similar to cultivars grafted on ‘M9’. Three-year-old wood developed more and longer lesions than either the 2-or the 1-year-old wood. A significant cultivar effect was observed with ‘Royal Gala’developing more lesions than the other cultivars tested. More than half of asymptomatic wounds placed onto apple sap-amended water agar for pathogen isolation yielded N. ditissima.