I think he was looking at the fruit in the background which is from the same tree which has the “sheepnose” shape.
I’m not an apple person but while researching the tree we just planted I do notice some similarities with a Bramley’s Seedling.
I am pretty sure it is not “Wolf River” or “Bramley’s Seedling”. And although the timing (mid-1920’s planting date) is wrong, and perhaps the ripening time (CA?), the apple looks like a “Buckley’s Giant”, a tree from WA State (1935). Buckley’s is an early bloomer and ripens in August - September in Western WA. Good resistance to scab and mildew, flavor fair, not a good keeper. -DV
This apple doesn’t sound like any of the guesses thus far. The apple looks to be too late and not a bad keeper so Buckleys doesn’t sound right. Maybe its related to Sheepnose, it does have some of its characteristics. But Sheepnose has nothing like the star bottom and its intensely colored normally, not just a little red, its one of the reddest apples there is.
Oh here is a picture of Sheepnose as grown in England, it does line up pretty well:
So maybe the ToA folks got it.
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Having ordered Antonovka for rootstocks…it’s very obvious there is great variation…so even though they may self-pollinate and reproduce pretty true, obviously open pollination can result in some surprises. I have one with leaves red as a crab apple.
I happen to have been poking around looking at older English apples a bit, and from what I can tell, the apple that’s called Sheep’s Nose in England appears to be a different apple from the Black Gillyflower/aka Sheep’s Nose. Or, perhaps more accurately, the name “Sheep’s Nose/Snout” appears to have been given to several (apparently unrelated?) old English/Irish apples that have that distinctive shape.
See:
https://futureforests.ie/products/apple-sheeps-nose
Note the reference to another apple, “Sheep’s Snout,” apparently an Irish cider apple.
http://www.gardenappleid.co.uk/index.php/alphabetic-list-of-apples/22-sheeps-nose
Note the reference to another “Sheep’s Nose,” mentioned by Hogg, but apparently different from the apple described here.
Note that 1951 is the date when the apple was entered in the Brogdale fruit collection - it’s actually quite a lot older than that (specific origin apparently unknown).
The English Sheep’s Nose described in these sources appears to be rather dry and primarily used for baking, but it is not a particularly late apple (its season in England is September/October). So, it’s probably not Noah’s apple. (It’s also described as being flushed rather than striped, and the striping on Noah’s apples does seem to be pretty marked.)
But assuming no better identification comes up, it seems like it would be in keeping with tradition to go ahead and call a dryish baking apple with that distinctive shape a Sheep’s Nose. The Sheep’s Nose of Santa Cruz?
I also think this is a Buckley Giant. My parents had one in the front yard growing up. I believe they were developed by a Nursery that used to be in Buckley, WA and I think my mom said they were a cross between a Jonathan and a Gravenstein. If it’s the same, they are crisp, sweet with a bit of tart, and will grow really big as long as the tree is kept pruned. They will also turn brown and mushy/bad very fast if they are bruised at all. My mom could often make a deep dish apple pie with 1-1/2 to 2 apples. The were huge and so good.
The tree also looks like my parent’s Buckley Giant that was in the front yard.