Apple Tree Varieties

I have a love/hate relationship with apples. I love eating them. My kids love eating them. In fact, it's not uncommon for them to go through a pound of apples per day. I hate that Stafford, Virginia does not have the ideal climate to grow them. Like tulips, apples are adapted to relatively cold areas. They prefer areas with lower humidity. The Shenandoah Valley grows most of the apples in the state of Virginia because it doesn't get as muggy at elevation. 

This map, from VirginiaApples.net, shows that most of the State's apples are grown at elevation.
The website is a good resource to find orchards that will allow you to pick your own apples.

Difficult does not mean impossible - particularly if you grow the right varieties. The above map also shows several apple orchards along the major rivers relatively close to the bay. The nearest orchard to us appears to be Westmoreland Berry Farm, near Colonial Beach. According to their facebook page in Sept. 2015, this orchard was growing Gala, Golden Supreme, Empire, Jonagold, Crispin, and Rome apples, which are pretty much all commercial varieties. 

What Makes a Good Commercial Variety of Apple? 

Commercial varieties of apples are chosen because they ship well to fulfill grocery stores' demand for fresh apples year-round. Commercial varieties need to keep and they need to sell at market. (This usually means that they need a nice color, consistent size/shape, a sweet taste, and some degree of name recognition.) Flavor is often sacrificed for durability.

In a backyard planting, the apples that are going to do the best are going to be disease resistant and have good flavor. We don't need to ship our apples across the state, so a delicate skin is OK. Good flavor is more important to a home gardener than consistent size and shape. However, I hate that most of the apple trees I see available for sale are the same commerical varieties I see in the store.

Why Don't I Want to Plant What I See in the Grocery Store?

Just because an apple is widely grown does not mean that it is going to be a good choice for our climate. Arguably, the more widely planted a given apple is, the more likely you are to have diseases that are able to target it. In fact, I have heard apple expert Dan Bussey compare diseases to computer hackers: they are constantly looking for a way to crack the apple's genetic code. And the more a single variety is planted, the more chances a disease has to crack that code.

Think of the Irish Potato famine. They had massive crop failure because almost every single potato in Ireland was one specific cultivar. Each potato had the exact same set and combination of genes because it is easier to propagate potatoes by cutting the tubers into "seed potatoes" than to grow potatoes from true seeds.

Just so you know, apples never come true from seed, so in order to get a specific variety of apple, you need to graft. That means that every single 'Fuji' apple out there, is actually the exact same tree with the exact same genes. The top half of the tree is grafted onto the root system for a different tree. These rootstocks are also cloned, and are given very short codes for names, like "M.9" or "G.5-A". In some ways, the way we grow apples today is the same as how the Irish grew potatoes before the great famine.

It doesn't need to be this way. Apples have a tremendous amount of genetic diversity. The way that apples mix their genes when they go to seed is dramatic. You could get little red crabapples from a seed inside a Granny Smith, for example. As a result, there are over 17,000 different cultivars of apples that have been grown in the United States alone since Colonial times. Many of the heirlooms were adapted to grow in specific regions with the accompanying soil, temperatures, humidity, and frost dates (relevant for not having your blossoms freeze).

A lot of the heirloom varieties have superior taste as well. And each cultivar has different properties. Some are sweet for fresh eating, some are tart. Some cultivars hold their shape for cooking while others are juicy and delicate. There are apples that have tastes or fragrances reminiscent of fruit punch, banana, raspberry ice cream, even turpentine. Some apple varieties are very old. "Ashmead's Kernel" has been grown since 1700 in England and Åkerö has been grown since the 1400s in Sweden, for example.  "Baldwin" has been grown since 1740 in Massachusetts. These varieties are tasty enough that people still grow them. "Fuji" is one of the most widely planted commerical cultivars at the moment, but even it dates to the 1930s in Japan. (I'd argue that it's so popular because it still has some of the full-bodied taste of the heirlooms.) The thing is, Fuji apples have become so popular at the grocery store that you consistently see it for sale at nurseries regardless of whether or not it does well in a given climate. (Fujis don't really like hot weather. A newer variety, called 'Red Fuji' does better in warm weather.)

What Have I Planted? 

I've generally stuck with apples that are noted for being low-care or for doing well in warm areas:   Arkansas Black, Stayman, and Enterprise are already on my property. Admittedly, I also purchased a new variety called Blushing Delight as a semi-impulse purchase at Home Depot earlier this week. Here's some more about the apples:

Arkansas Black Spur is known for being able to handle hot, humid summers and for keeping really well in storage. (It is hard as a brick when it is harvested and needs to sit around for a few months before it's soft enough to eat, at which point it becomes a tasty desert apple.) I planted this apple so I would have something for storage and for cooking. It does not brown when cut, which makes it good for salads or school lunches. Also, I needed to have a pollinator for Enterprise. I was running low on compost when I originally planted this apple. I started with a small specimen, and it is noted for having a slow growth habit. It's still really small. 

Enterprise is known for tasting relatively similar to Fuji, but with better disease resistance. It tastes spicy right off the tree (still tasty) and then mellows in storage. Many of the apples from the same breeding program that produced it are noted for being good in hot weather (e.g. Goldrush, Williams Pride, Pristine). I planted this one for fresh eating. This is a late-season apple. It is doing the best of any of the apples currently on my property. Granted, I also bought a larger specimen and then took extra care to amend the soil with organic matter, and keep it especially well-watered... This could explain most of the difference.  

Stayman is a triploid variety, meaning it has 3 sets of chromosomes instead of the usual 2. This means it can't pollinate other apple varieties. It is an older, heirloom variety of apple that is extremely disease resistant and hardy. It is good for cider/juice, baking, and fresh eating and is widely planted in the Shenandoah valley. It doesn't keep at room temperature for very long, but can be stored in the refrigerator for 6 weeks.) I plan to use mine for juice. Mine had a major setback due to some deer damage and I am waiting to see how well it recovers this year. 

Blushing Delight is something I saw it at the Home Depot, along with another variety from the same breeding program (Tangy Green). I noticed that it is a columnar tree that only gets 2 feet wide and 8-10 feet tall. Now I've heard of a few columnar apple varieties before, but this one was new to me, so I did a quick google search on it using my phone for any notes about disease resistance. I discovered it was developed a few years ago (2009) in the Czech Republic in order to work as a patio container tree or in a small garden. It is supposed to have good disease resistance. 

The chilling requirements are listed as 800-1200 chill hours in comparison to 500-600 chill hours for Arkansas Black and 800 for Stayman. So I had to ask myself it this area is cold enough for it. The Czech Republic has a varied climate across the country. It seems to be a bit more mild than here with slightly warmer winters and cooler summers. Some areas of the country are dramatically warmer than here, but the apple is supposed to have good cold tolerance (to zone 4). The only chill hour map I could find for our area notes we should expect to get around 1500 chill hours here in Stafford on an average year, which exceeds the variety's minimum chill hour requirement. I decided to plant it as a trial. I really want to see how it does given how little space it needs to grow. 

A Note on Apple Tree Vendors

Each year, a lot of different stores carry fruit trees: Home Depot, Lowes, even Kmart and Costco.

I always approach fruit tree selections from big box stores with a bit of skepticism. A national chain tries to standardize its selections for the sake of corporate simplicity and the ease of maintaining its website. I never know who selects and orders the plant varieties for specific stores. Is it an experienced horticulturalist who is allowed some degree of autonomy? Or someone whose main exposure to gardening is tallying the weekly sales totals for the entire eastern seaboard?  

Ultimately, a big box store is going to offer what they think will sell, and often, this translates into what people specifically ask for.  The thing is, people generally only ask for the commercial varieties because, unless you grow a non-commercial variety, that's all they've ever eaten. Although commercial varieties are widely planted, eaten, and requested, that doesn't mean it's a good for a given area.  

For example, this year, I've seen lots of Honeycrisp apples available for sale. However, according to this article in The Seattle Times, "Its flavor is inconsistent and fades in long storage and it is maddeningly difficult to grow." (Emphasis mine.) As much as I like the taste of a good Honeycrisp apple, I'm not sure if it is really suitable for the home hobby grower. Tim Burford's book notes that Honeycrisp apples generally do not get their characteristic sweetness and crisp texture in southern climates. 

The trees at the big box stores are often very reasonably priced. I'm not above grabbing a good deal if I happen to see a good plant, but the selection is often limited. I always like to do my own research (even on my phone) to double check how suitable a given cultivar will be.

I am also always careful to inspect the trees for disease. Big box stores offer great prices because they don't exactly pay top dollar for top horticulturalists. That said, I have seen horribly diseased fruit trees at one of our local small nurseries on Garrisonville Road. It was in the middle of last summer, well past major fruit tree planting season, and I mentioned it to the staff, so hopefully the diseased trees were trashed.

If you are looking to add some diversity to your garden, here are a few specialty vendors... 

* Big Horse Creek Farm - based in North Carolina. They have an extensive list of warm climate apples. They operate as a custom order nursery. You find a variety you like, place a request for them to graft it, and they send it to you. Because of the small size of the nursery and the time involved, they need to have orders by March 1 for delivery the following November. They also sell extra trees in Mid-September. They have an excellent reputation.*

* Edible Landscaping - based near Charlottesville, VA. I have personally ordered from them on more than one occasion. They have good selection, but are a little understaffed on weekends.

* Kuffel Creek - based in Southern California. They focus on trying to find apples that thrive in hot weather. (Note: this does not necessarily mean humid weather.) Oddly, they have even found some varieties of apples that are apple that are able to grow in arid areas of Africa (which generally goes against the accepted knowledge of apple chilling hour requirements).
* Old VA Apples - this website hasn't been updated in a while, but they have a list of apples that have been traditionally planted in Virginia. Since most of Virginia's apples are grown at elevation, you may want to find out whether the apples were also grown in the Piedmont areas. 

* Trees of Antiquity - this site specializes in heirloom fruit tree varieties. You would need to do your own research to see how well they would work in Stafford County.This company also has a excellent reputation online.*

If you end up seeing a variety (at a local nursery or online), http://www.orangepippin.com/apples/ is an excellent quick reference to a gazillion different apple varieties. If you prefer to read books, Apples of North America: 192 exceptional varieties for gardeners,growers, and cooks by Tom Burford is available through the Rappahannock Regional library.

*Dave's Gardening World has a site to rate the reputation of mail order nurseries, here.