Apple tree - when / how to thin fruit on youngish tree

[Philthy]

My now 4 year old Kidds Orange Red tree looks like it could give it's first, tentative crop of apples this year. Excellent!
There are about 20 or so clusters of blossoms dotted around the tree. I've not looked too closely but each cluster appears to be about 6-7 flowers.

Questions are:
At this early stage in the tree's life will this first flush be any good?
Should I thin the flowers and if so by roughly how many per cluster?
Do I thin now, when they become tiny fruits, or later still?
Or should I nip off all blossoms so the tree can concentrate it's energy on continuing to grow and develop? It's about 9' tall on MM106 rootstock.

Cheers guys.

[fishpond]

I see no harm in letting a 4yr old, 9 foot tree, fruit.
You will no doubt lose a few in the June drop anyway.

[SkyChild]

Let it fruit - 4 years is plenty
I think for thinning you wait until you've got a few smallish fruits and then just pluck them off so they are not overcrowded.
But the tree will drop some anyway

[Jungle Jane]

Thin the fruit not the flowers. I did mine today,the apples are about 1cm big,you need to see what fruit you've got & some will come off the tree easily like they're weaker. I also get rid of the smaller looking ones,I leave about 10cm between each apple so they don't touch each other when they grow.

[Martin H]

I always wait until the tree has dropped all the ones it wants to before thinning.

I understand that they tend to drop the ones without many pips in, because they aren't worth the effort of bringing to maturity. I can't tell which those are, so once the tree is happy I take some more off to reduce the load, get bigger fruit and to discourage biennial bearing.

[Philthy]

I'll leave it be then and see what happens.

Cheers.