I live in the mountains of central Arizona. We have cold winters and a hot dry summer climate that is especially hard on early apples. Two apples that have really stood out were Moyers Spice and Striped Sweeting. Large apples with great flavor and wonderful texture. Both are pretty rare heirlooms but scions are available from Horne Creek in North Carolina. Two more I really like, although they are a little later is Sweet Bough and Red Gravenstein, both from Trees of Antiquity.
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I had read through a lot of articles about the Gravenstein apple ( not the Red Gravenstein though) that it does not last long after being picked. I had considered the Sweet Bough but I did not know anyone in my zone that had one planted and had any fruit from it.
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Yeah Gravensteins don’t last long but they sure are a great apple. Vigorous triploid that really tastes good and is easy to grow. Great multipurpose apple. One of my favorites. Sweet Bough is a natural dwarf, not a very big tree, unlike Gravenstein, but it produces early and heavily. Like Gravenstein but not as tart. I’m also growing Sunday Sweet which is another early apple related to Sweet Bough. They should be ready any day now so we’ll see how those compare.
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Apple names are funny… sometimes they just rhyme or are spelled differently, but are the same apple. I checked the Temperate Orchard Conservancy list and they have a Moyers Prize and a Striped Beefing. Beefing seems like an unlikely name for an apple… now I have to go down a rabbit hole and see if it’s the same.
I love my Pink Pearl for about a week or two, but it goes mushy not long after that. I am eagerly awaiting my Blairmonts, which should be ready in about 3 weeks. I haven’t tried gravenstein because I don’t think I need 2 mushy apples.
Some other August apples I have grafted but not tasted yet: Almata, Centennial Crab, Cole’s Quince, Devonshire Crimson, Discovery,Queener Donut,William’s Pride, and Wynooche. The later one I have now grafted 3 times. I generally have 80% of so make it so I don’t know why the last two years they didn’t live. If this year’s a bust for Wynooche, too, I’ll consider it a sign.
Has anyone tried sweet June, Red June or June Striped? It would be great to start the season even earlier.
Blairmont getting some size to it.
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I tried growing Wynoochee Early in Spokane. It ceased growing in high heat for two months several years running. It stood on Gen30, which is one of two favorite stocks, so I know it wasn’t held back by the rootstock. I also got a box of Wynoochee grown in/near Royal City, in central WA. That is true desert, even hotter & drier than my place. Those apples had been picked, according to the store clerk, just a couple days before I bought them. Mealy & tasteless.
That prompted me to graft Lamb Abbey, which is not as early, coming ripe here around August 25, but the tree is tough & apples unforgettable. Lamb Abbey now stands where Wynoochee once stood.
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I was really disappointed in my Wynooche Early. I had high expectations for this apple. It only produced a few apples for a few years and they were not really all that great. So I took it out. Not interested in a so-so apple that does not produce enough apples year after year.
I planted a Williams Pride two years ago and I have a few apples on it this year. I am letting the apples hang until ripe just to try them out.
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I have 7 novamac apples and one new trailman graft with a nice apple on my novamac on b9.
These have colored up nicely… and last year all the novamac dropped from the espellar ripe the last week of July or Aug 1.
Trailman should ripen mid August in TN… will find out soon.
TNHunter
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Carolina Red June is pretty good for an early apple on the NorCal coast. Early Harvest is prolific and reliable but softer and more tart. Trailman is very early and pretty good, but quite small. Williams’ Pride and Viking are probably the best apples of the season here. Mott’s Pink is interesting and bears soon after.
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The earliest apples of any quantity for me this year is Aunt Rachel. Not the greatest dessert apple, just “OK” for eating out of hand. We made fried/cinnamon apples with them though and that was great. They hold their shape well. They’d likely be good in a pie I suspect.
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Hi, Jerry. Where did you find your Viking? I noticed you documented bloom and harvest dates on Pomiferous but didn’t see anything else in a cursory internet search.
I got my scion from fellow member Derek Mills (@derekamills). If you don’t already have a copy of his spreadsheet of available varieties at Hocking Hills Orchard, contact him and he’ll E-mail you one.
I understand that Viking was a product of PRI’s scab-resistant apple project. It failed at the primary objective and thus wasn’t released, but was good enough that it escaped into the wild and has been circulating since.
Here, Viking should be ripe with the next week or so. It’s white-fleshed with red staining near the skin, and highly fragrant, with an unusual rose scent and flavor component. Its fellow PRI graduate Williams’ Pride has some of this, but it’s more pronounced in Viking.
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I love rose scented apples! Thank you for the recommendation.
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Here’s another good thread about early apples in case anyone else is looking to extend their season:
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Found 2 novamac and 1 trailman crab ripe today.
One of the novamacs and the trailman had dropped to the grass. The other novamac released when I touched it.
TNHunter
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In terms of flavor, the Red June is the best late June-July apples I’ve tasted. They are soft, apples small, trees somewhat prone to blight in areas where temps are ideal for blight during bloom. I have not tried the Gravenstein, Pristine, Arkcharm, St. Clair. The all get great reviews and are early.
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My first apple of the year. Picked July 11th. What you don’t see if the mark on the side, which is why it ripened early. I cut around the mark and ate it anyways. I picked a few more yesterday, and should get more in the next couple of weeks, if not sooner.
Edit-Variety is Williams Pride
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What variety of Apple?
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Sorry about that, that’s important. It’s William’s Pride.
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Having a few William’s Pride apples myself, bumper crop. Is your apple ripe?
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We ate the first couple of novamac apples this week… and a trailman crab.
Novamac is a nice eating apple, excellent mix of sweet and tart, nice flavor.
Trailman… this was my first time trying one. I really liked it. It had more of a punch to it… a wow tartness similar to my early mc. but
nicely sweet too.
Edit add later… checked my novamac b9 espellar around noon… and the largest novamac apple had dropped.
Myself, my wife and our granddaughter shared that apple at lunchtime. Very nice.
TNHunter
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