This article appeared in Garden Compass

Antique Apples:

our connection to the past

In the world of antique apples everything old becomes new again. With more attention paid to nutritional needs, an increased taste for food with a history and a desire to support local agriculture has fueled a renewed interest in antique or heirloom apples.

That elusive antique apple

Over 17,000 apple varieties have been recorded throughout history, but today we most often come in contact with a mere handful of familiar grocery store varieties like Golden Delicious, Macintosh, Fuji and Granny Smith.

Since most of us are familiar with apples that are perfectly rounded, smooth and red, at first glance, antique apples can look rather unusual. Not so the great varieties of antique apples. They can be misshapen compared to their popular counterparts. Often they are too oddly shaped to be picked by machines which can make them too delicate for mass production. These apples rarely make it to market or even the fruit stand so that orchards dedicated to grow them are rarer still.

History

The Greeks and Romans referred to apples as symbols of love and beauty. When the Romans moved on England they brought apple cultivation with them. Soon apple growing became common practice in England and other parts of Europe. Both apple seeds and trees traveled from England to America around the early 1600s and before long nearly every farmer planted and grew apple trees.

The California Apple Industry's roots go back to the 1800s, when two early orchards were located in Watsonville and Sebastopol along the Central and Northern coastal regions. Today there are more than 450 growers.

"One of Thomas Jefferson's favorite apples was the Calbel Blanc Winter apple," says Jim Woods, antique apple grower in Oak Glen, CA. "He had twelve trees shipped to him from France. If you go back to Monticello today you will probably find them there."

Woods has grown antique apples for over 20 years in the San Bernardino Mountains just outside of the Palm Springs/Redlands area. His varieties include Calbel Blanc Winter dating back to the 1500s, Lady Apple or Snow Apple; Arkansas Black; Newton Pippin; White Winter Pear Maine; and Simerinko, a popular apple in Russia.

Growing the Countless varieties:

"Apples cross pollinate with each other and it's very difficult to get a seed to grow up and become a tree that looks just like the parent tree," said Matt Barthel, garden and orchard manager of Seeds Savers Exchange, Decorah, Iowa. "However, if you take a cutting called a scion of the tree it will be a clone of the parent tree."

Seeds Savers Exchange is a non-profit organization dedicated to preserving agricultural history. The orchard is home to nearly 300 varieties of antique apples.

"We're out here in the middle of nowhere in Decorah, Iowa, yet we get about 5,000 visitors a year," said Barthel. "Hardcore gardeners come here just to look around. We had this lady from Los Angeles come here last year and spend a week walking around our orchard."

Love of apples and the range of varieties drive most gardeners, along with the desire and commitment to care for the apple tree.

Apple growing is only limited by your location in the Golden State. Depending on the variety, apple trees require 100 to 1,200 chill hours to set their fruit. At issue when planting an antique apple tree is the vastly different landscape that goes to make up California and the diverse microclimates.

"Some of the varieties propagated by early California growers that are offshoots of the antique apple are Sierra Beauty, Pink Pearl, Wickson, Pink Sparkle, and Petingill," said Thomas Linden, co-owner, Trees of Antiquity, Paso Robles, CA. "Good for warm coastal locations are the Dorset Gold, Anna, and Petingill."

Since the Sierras and Northern California share the same heat and chill factors for apples there are several varieties that do extremely well there including Mutsu, Kingston Black, Summer Rose, Pink Pearl, and Snow.

Some varieties that do well in the Southern California area are Gravenstein, Snow, Dolgo Crab, and White Astrachan.

American varieties of the antique apple include Swaar from New York, Summer Rose from New Jersey, Stayman Winesap from Kansas, Arkansas Black from Arkansas, Black Gilliflower from Connecticut, and Baldwin from Massachusetts

"Cider varieties are starting to be more popular with city dwellers," said Linden. "Porter's Perfection, Fearn's Pippin, Taylor's Cider Apple, and Termblett's Bitter. We have about 150 varieties of apples right now.".

Black Gilliflower, introduced around the 1700s in Connecticut, is pear-like in flavor and has an unusual conical shape.

Pink Pearl, first introduced in 1944 in California, was named for the pink flesh hidden beneath its yellow exterior is crisp, tart, and aromatic, with a hint of grapefruit in the taste.

Ashmeads Kernel is a medium sized, greenish yellow fruit with brown blush covered with a heavy russet and is not especially known for its attractiveness. The apple is crisp and tart with peak flavor in early November, good for making excellent tasting cider and will keep for three to four months. It was raised by Dr. Ashmead in England in the 18th century and was introduced in the early 1700s.

The eternal apples tree:

Gardening connects us to the earth. When you plant an apple tree you establish a relationship with that plant.

"An antique apple tree is a connection to the past, a connection to the roots of our grandparents," said Linden. "The best thing is there's a connection to the small family farms that are the basis of this country. These trees are windows that allow us to look back to different times."

No fruit is more elementary, more legendary, or more popular than the apple. Antique apples are the earth's legacy to humankind