A good answer could include planting the trees on the north-facing flank of a hill (passive) and providing overhead irrigation to allow the grower to give plants an ice coating (active). Apples grown in New York face their strongest threat during bloom-time. North-facing plantings partway up a hillside delays bloom-time to later in spring, reducing the odds of the plants experiencing a hard frost. Irrigation allows the grower to take advantage of the severe overall cold that can be associated with a freeze in upstate New York by using the cold to create a protective ice layer that can preserve the blossoms.
The rate of water uptake by the plant would be greatly reduced.
Root hairs increase the surface areas to volume ratio by which the roots absorb water from the soil. This means the plant will not be able to effectively replace water lost by evapo-transpiration and the plant will wilt especially on a hot day.
