Author: Carl Nollen,
Runnells, Iowa
Lee Calhoun, in his 2007 article reprinted in the current Winter 2018 Pomona laments “people who are interested in antique apples are no longer in NAFEX or are silent….No one….should ever be criticized for collecting and writing about antique apples.”
I have a special liking for “soft” apples which I prefer to call “mellow.” Because they are “soft,” rather than firm and crisp, you won’t see them at farmers’ markets and certainly never in the grocery store.
Here are ten antique apple varieties I have grown for over 40 years and recommend:
Ashmead Kernel. A small, greenish yellow apple with the most intense flavor of any. It will pucker your mouth. Not attractive, but it tastes so good!
Chenango Strawberry. A beautiful shiny early August apple with light yellow background and rosy stripes. My semi-dwarf tree died last year and I have already planted a new tree. I miss it!
Duchess of Oldenburg. Medium to large light yellow with light red striping ready late July. The first of all my early varieties. All early apples are “mellow.”
Kandil Sinap. A tall skinny tree with small, skinny apples. Beautiful light yellow skin with rosy blushes and a “porcelain” finish. Will not win any taste tests, but the tree is prolific and an ideal variety for a small space.
Mother. A very late tree – noticeably later than all the others to leaf out and bloom. But it catches up. A smallish, mellow apple with orangey flesh. I really like this one!
Opalescent. A large, deep red, late apple that has some brown rot problems.
Oriole. An early August apple which tree needs plenty of room and as much sun as possible. The one apple I will plant this spring in a better place to replace the present.
Snow. This famous apple with its snow-white flesh and distinctive spicy flavor is not like any other apple variety. A mellow apple that is a poor keeper.
Swaar. The word is Dutch for “heavy.” A very late apple that hangs on after frost. If you didn’t get them picked on time, be rewarded with a beautiful sight of a bare tree with big golden globes hanging on. My tree is now in too much shade and I must replace
Zabergau Reinette. Large, rough-skinned, russeted, golden brown apple. Many grow as large as a small grapefruit. One of my most reliable trees. I have given away many bagsful of these apples.
All my trees are unsprayed. The above apples do well with my organic “neglect.” I also do not prune my trees to the ideal that a bird must be able to freely fly through it. My orchard is not an apple factory! I want it to look like a part of the landscape.
I have some antique varieties that have not done well and some modern varieties that I really like. One standard tree I have is a mystery variety. My truck driver coworkers liked it better than any I brought to work. I am going to buy Mr. Bussey’s new set of books on apple varieties and see if I can find it there.
Not that I needed that impetus to buy his magnum opus!
We had a very hot, dry July. I have noticed that apple trees do well enough in Iowa’s extreme climate, including drought. Many of my trees are biennial bearers. I don’t have an answer to this. Some of them are too close together. This is a problem common to those of us have with limited space, who still
try to grow everything we would like.
It seems that semi-dwarf varieties have a shorter life span than standard. Some of them have died or seem to be on their way out. Has anyone else noticed this? If this sub-zero weather we are having now in early January lets up, my chain saw will get a workout and my neighbor will get a lot of apple wood for his grill!
I have a couple pieces of advice to beginners; give your trees plenty of room. If you want early apples, plant some of these varieties I have named. They are all good eating apples. Wealthy and Yellow Transparent may be more common, but they are so inferior!
A sweet pleasure of life is going out into your orchard and picking your dessert off the tree.
