Apple Recommendations - NE TN

General Fruit Growing
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First, a bit of background… I’ve posted here before, but don’t believe I’ve properly introduced myself/us. We live in Northeast Tennessee, at about 1600’ elevation, zone 7a. We have just under half an acre cleared and (recently) fenced, with self grafted apple/peach/pear/plum/cherry, etc… There’s enough room for more, I’m thinking of adding ~14 (apple) varieties next spring. The area is unfortunately on the ~north side of a hill and surrounded by mature forest. More sun would be nice, but it is what it is… The soil at least is very good, as weeds can attest to… Springs/creek not many feet below, will pump/irrigate if summer is too dry.

The “recent” comment on fencing is because deer are plentiful here, and they have “pruned” my apple trees every year. Grrr… First grafted trees planted in 2015 (all on M111), have added a few more each year. Current apple varieties:

Stayman (Qty 4)
Old Stayman
Winesap
Arkansas Black
Horse
Pippin
Jonathan
Wolf River
Mutsu
Early Harvest
Virginia Beauty
“Hoppy Duncan”
Late Strawberry
Snow

Stayman has been mine and my wife’s favorite for a long time, so it’s the only one we have multiple of. We attended a grafting class by the local extension agent and at first we only picked from what scion wood locals were nice enough to offer. Last year I ordered a few varieties unavailable there, planning on getting more heirloom and other varieties going forward.

At the grafting class there was offered “Old Stayman”, no idea if the current Stayman is a sport of it or ?. The Pippin available there was unfortunately not labeled beyond that, so not sure what variety. The “Hoppy Duncan” variety is simply the name I’ve given it, based on being told that was the man’s name who had an orchard in Southwest Virginia, many years ago. He was long gone and there were only a few living trees, among large hardwoods that had grown up and consumed the orchard. An uncle recovered some scion wood from one and grafted it, and gave me a cutting from it this year. Can’t wait to see what it is when it finally fruits.

Also have some English Walnut, Hazelnut, native red/black raspberries, thornless blackberries, blueberries, etc… Outside the fenced area we have multiple mature black walnuts, hickories, pawpaws, etc… We planted a couple of butternut walnuts a few years back, not fruited yet, can’t wait to try one. My older relatives rave about them, never had the opportunity myself.

Back to apples… I’ve read tons of threads on here, and other places, researched reviews, etc… I have a list picked out, but have many in the “maybe” column as well. Just curious if anyone would be willing to make any suggestions, perhaps related to area, perhaps based on taste from what I’ve indicated we like. If there is enough room, I’ll probably add more in coming years, this hobby is addictive :slight_smile:

Definites:
King David - My favorite as a kid…
Hawkeye Delicious - Wife’s parents had a “Red Delicious” that’s now gone, she says it was fantastic. Want to get what we suspect it might have been…

Feel pretty confident about (highly rated and/or just interested in):
Ashmead’s Kernel
Rubi[e]nette
Roxbury Russet
Black Limbertwig
Esopus Spitzenburg
Newton Pippin

Planning on, but quite willing to swap out with recommendation:
Karmijn De Sonnaville
Hooples Antique Gold
Blue Pearmain
Melrose
Baldwin
Blenheim Orange

Been on/off the above list:
Hall, Grimes Golden, Bramley’s Seedling, Kidd’s Orange Red, Magnum Bonum, etc…

The only two I’ve yet to find a commercial scion source for are Hooples and Blenheim.

So, any recommendations? Any to avoid? We know we like Stayman, Winesap, Ark Black, Ginger Gold, etc… Unfortunately have never tasted many of the others.

Thanks.

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The only two I’ve tried from your list are Melrose and Ashmead’s Kernel. I like both quite a bit. Both have high acid and high sugar, with Ashmead’s being a little more intense. I’m guessing you’d get more production from Melrose. Ashmead’s is said to have biennial tendencies. Mine has not produced back to back years for me yet, so that might be true. It is, however, only 4 or 5 years old.

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Looks like you’re doing pretty good without any assistance here!

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King David in certain places in certain years can be a fireblight monster. If you plan to spray for blight then maybe KD can work for you. I’d keep a close eye on it and yank it if it gets bad blight. It does have fabulous taste though.

Three other good ones bred for disease resistance: Freedom Sept, Enterprise Oct, MonArk July. All three taste really good to me. After decades of chasing nostalgic old heirlooms I more and more appreciate the strong disease resisters.

If you like your Black Limbertwig, in future you might consider adding Swiss or Royal Limbertwig too.

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Karmijn and Blue Pearmain might not be very good in your climate. Karmijn doesn’t like heat at all. Blue Pearmain doesn’t have much flavor in the heat and is prone to mealiness.

All the other ones should be good apples for you. On your on/off list I would say Kidds and Magnum Bonum are both very good choices. Hall got horrible fireblight and nearly killed the Black Limbertwig on the same trunk. Bramley’s is a limited use apple, its mainly for sauce. Grimes is a good one as well. I have little direct experience with it, the deer took all but one this year so I have yet to make a firm opinion on it.

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Thank you everyone! Very good info, much appreciated… Decisions decisions…

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Well, what did you decide on??

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Well… I ordered a number of scions from Kelleys, some of which he ended up no longer having (deer). He sent alternatives, mainly his choices… He’s almost “local” so what grows well where he’s at will hopefully do the same here.

The local extension agent’s grafting class was flush with more scion choices this year than I’d seen in the past. So I left there with a pretty good bundle as well…

I’ve purchased rootstock from the extension office exclusively so far, and they require certain quantity multiples (7’s). So I ended up getting 21, thinking I’d double up some grafts in case one died. I ended up with more scions than I anticipated though, more even than I had individual rootstock for.

Oh and about this time my neighbor gave me 7 trees he had grafted a few years ago, and never got around to planting (they were in pots without a lot of dirt, and not a lot of growth), and were mainly varieties I wasn’t super interested in.

So I top-worked those 7, grafted the 21, and limb-grafted scions to some established trees. I’d never really given a lot of thought to creating “frankentrees” in the past, but am apparently well on my way now :slight_smile:

Of the original 16 trees I had, I just put a strike-through on Early Harvest in my spreadsheet. Not sure why it died, but it’s a goner…

What I’ve since added is: Sunrise, Honeycrisp, Myers Royal Limbertwig, Hawkeye Delicious, Rusty Coat, Chenango Strawberry, Summer Rambo, Crimson Crisp, Pinova, Smokehouse, Northern Spy, Winter Banana, Old-Fashioned Red Delicious, Newtown Pippin, Black Limbertwig, Baldwin, Grimes Golden, Blenheim Orange, Honey Cider, Red Astrachan, Carters Blue, Weavers Red Sweet Limbertwig, Captain Davis, Winter Terry, Red Royal Limbertwig, Monte Carlo, Mountain Boomer, Kinsei, Ashmeads Kernel, Wine Crisp, Roxbury Russett, and Milam.

A few of those leafed out (I was 100% on grafts for the first time this year!) only to die later. Wind or birds breaking the graft unions I suspect, don’t know for sure. Anyway, I still have pieces of the scion wood in the fridge for most of them. Am planning on grafting them to limbs of established trees very soon, assuming that’s likely to work this late?

Once I transplant all of these from pots to my orchard space, there won’t be a lot of room for additional trees. So going forward, I’ll likely continue grafting interesting varieties to limbs of established trees. Addictive hobby…

The “Old Stayman” tree is one I grafted multiple scions to. Because last fall we purchased some at a local fruit stand, and weren’t super impressed. I believe it’s a sport of Stayman, less tasty but more red, and taste is far more important to me than looks. So it only has a single limb left and will now be a “multi” tree. I imagine some other varieties will gravitate higher on my list of “to be top-worked over” as we get to taste them. No snap decisions though, realizing the first crop on many trees is not all that representative of how they’ll taste on a more mature tree.

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Great work, great reply.

I’m guessing most of those varieties will work out fine in E Tennessee.

I have around 70 varieties…mostly in pots, and not sure if or when I’ll actually put many of them in the ground.
(Either Knoxville or Morristown is under 2 hours for me.)

Birds, opossums, already making away with my fruit.

bb

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Thanks… Hopefully they all grow healthy and produce abundantly. In 3 months the bare-root potted and grafted trees have put on ~3’ of growth each. This year seems to be the year for that, everything is putting on tons of new vegetative growth.

We’re a little over an hour from Morristown, 1.5hrs from Knoxville. Didn’t realize you were in KY, always interesting to read where folks are and the kinds of things they grow and the challenges they face. We have a new dog, and quite a few cats. I didn’t realize just how many moles/voles we had until the cats started bringing them in for our approval. Hopefully one or the other will keep the groundhogs away.

I didn’t get a King David scion this year, but will next year. My mother has a friend she found out has a tree so I’m already invited to come collect from it this winter. Already thinking about what others sound interesting that I’d like to grow as well :slight_smile: Any recommendations from your experience with those 70 varieties, love to hear about.

Thanks.

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