That looks beautiful! hmm I’m leaning now to Rubinette instead of Cox Orange Pippin…Rubinette was described as hard to grow on orangepippin.com but you reported it was productive for you in a difficult year. This guy on youtube reported it was unproductive and difficult to grow for him (Rubinette Apple review - YouTube), I wonder if its harder to grow in England? Another person reported it does handle heat well, maybe even will appreciate our dry summer compared to England? Really hard to tell but I’m convinced by your actual experience and tempting pictures
I’m still thinking between Golden Russet and Husdon’s Golden Gem. I’m leaning toward Golden Russet now as well because of your experience (and also, it seems like an exceptionally sweet russet!) and its reported to have some scab resistance. It appears Golden Russet stores better than Hudson’s Golden Gem too so that’s another point in its favor.
Between GoldRush and Grimes Golden, I’m still mulling…
So I entered this thread thinking COP, King of Pippins, and Hudson’s Golden Gem and now I’m thinking about growing three different trees, lol! Thankful for all your input
Thank you for the tip! I didn’t know of any orchards in my area growing heirloom varieties but Queener has so many!! It is about an hour and half south but I’ll have find a hike in the area and make it day
Thanks for the list! You must have such a beautiful orchard!!
Karmijn de Sonnaville is at the top of my list of apples I have to taste! It’s reported on Raintree to thrive in my region too (they are Western WA too). Maybe I should grow this one instead of Rubinette…ahhh, so many choices!
Well … I only have the one apple, one pear, and two plums, and I get the variety through grafts. Some varieties only give me two or three apples, if any, per year.
I don’t spray at all, and my trees don’t get as much care as I’d like.
My Karmijn graft has yet to produce good fruit. The couple I tried may not have been at their prime. My Rubinette is in a better protected location though, It’s caged and larger animals don’t have access to it.
The Karmijn was sour. Runinette has plenty of acid, but is balanced with plenty of sugar to my palate. I thought I would love Karmijn, but that has yet to be realized.
Goldrush is a heavy and dependable bearer. Also precocious, which is especially appreciated by newer growers I think.
you’ve won me over on all three of your top recommendations, they are sitting in my shopping cart now: Rubinette, Goldrush, and Golden Russet! regular producers are very important (which grimes golden is not) and I wouldn’t have known about these without your help! thank you!!
Rubinette and Gold Rush will go biennial if you don’t thin well.
Ask me how I know
I have these 3 varieties.
Golden Russet sets annually and is a semi-tip bearer. A medium to large apple with good flavor but is not on my favorite list.
Rubinette is a small but flavorful apple.
Gold Rush is a medium size apple that needs long warm days to ripen properly. Most years, in my zone 6a, it does not ripen in time. When it ripens well, it is an excellent apple that keeps until May.
Goldrush may not fully ripen for me, but it gets good enough to be better than many. It’s much riper than the ones Portland Nursery would have at its tastings. Those were green. Mine get full yellow, but don’t get much blush.
Joanie Cooper has highly recommended Gravenstein to me, and I intend to grow it.
Don’t mind the weeds. Here is my Goldrush espalier. I’d also added Somerfeld (2018) to it, then Era (2021). Apparently I didn’t have the reserve attention to properly train them, and they are already fruiting.
Egremont Russet is a spectacular dessert apple. It might be the best russet I’ve ever eaten. It has a rich complex flavor and a great texture. I’ve had a tree for two years in SW Missouri with no problems of any kind so far. It had two apples earlier this summer but I cut them off so the tree could focus on vegetative growth. It is supposed to be scab resistant. The Japanese beetles have avoided it while stripping nearby apple trees. It has no cedar apple rust even though nearby trees do.
This is a photo from a British nursery of an espaliered tree -
I tasted my first Pitmaston Pineapple this week. It was a drop and had some damage. But the flavor was very good. It had an intense flavor which reminded me of Ashmead’s Kernel or Newtown Pippin.
I am curious about Rubinette and have a few questions. Has anyone seen any fireblight? It’s supposed to be suceptible. Also the scion vigor is supposed to be weak so are you using a rootstock with more vigor to compensate for the lack of vigor in the scion?
I couldn’t easily find the tags on these trees to read the rootstock. Maybe the tag is under the tree wrap. But it is a dwarfing rootstock. Trees are 7 years from grafting to a bare root rootstock.
They both have plenty vigor for the espalier. I wouldn’t want more.
I don’t think we have much fire blight pressure here, but I haven’t seen it on my Rubinette. Doesn’t fire blight like vigorous growth?
edit: found the tag, apparently I wasn’t yet using safety wire to tie them and the twine had disintegrated. It is on Bud 9 and was grafted in 2015.
Yes, vigorous growth makes a tree more likely to get fireblight in general. But you can get fireblight on susceptible cultivars even if the vigor is low. Pomiferous lists it as susceptible, the entry for it is under Rafzubin which appears to be the original (patent?) name and Rubinette is the marketing name.
I just ordered Cox Orange Pippin, I had this variety in the Bay Area but I don’t remember if I ever ate one. After seeing Dave Wilson testing on high chill variety hear my house, I’m taking a risk again.
, though they look pretty good on the surface.