Here are the 3 apples I pulled from my Dorsett yesterday…being the first time I’ve actually been able to get apples from this tree, I’m not entirely sure how long they usually take to ripen, but we’ve had a lot of rain the last 3 weeks and I didn’t want to risk losing my skimpy harvest…Left one on the tree to experiment with and will see how long it takes to drop…
I’m kinda in the same boat. I have 15 apples and only the very oldest have a crop this year. And sadly that’s kinda the new norm for me…
McIntosh (planted '91) is simply a huge tree and is just loaded. Old reliable!
Haralson (planted '94) has what I will consider a full crop though less than many years. Wish I liked this better.
EarliBlaze (planted '91) is loaded despite one major scaffold dying due to deer deciding after all these years to utilize it in their antler raking operation…
Red Delicious (planted '91) unfortunately has a full crop. (I doubt I could kill this tree with a chainsaw let alone expect the deer to help me out…)
Empire (planted '08) has a nice crop, though lighter than some years. Really liking this apple more every year.
On the other hand, I have a Honeycrisp I planted the same day I planted the Empire in '08 and we’ve only had a year or two when it made apples at all, and only very few then. Big time disgusted with this stinker (and the apples were soooo good that one year…)
I’ve got two Goldrush and a Sweet Sixteen that went in ground in’13 and are still no-shows, and a Yellow Del that’s been in since '11 and hasn’t fruited yet.
From the History of the Hawkeye.
Started as a small insignificant Seedling in Jesse Hiatt’s Peru, Iowa orchard, about 1870, the original Delicious tree was not welcomed or heralded as the beginning of an apple that in time would be said to represent the crowning point of achievement in the origination of American varieties. On the contrary, Mr. Hiatt twice unceremoniously cut down the young tree because it was not in the row.
It looks like all your trees are on standard rootstocks. They take a long time to fruit. My HC take at least 6-7 years to set fruit (and only two flower clusters) and then, skipped the next year, bloomed heavily the year after. And its biennial cycle continued.
If you plant more apples, you may want to choose rootstocks known to produce sooner. My Gold Rush on M 7, planted in 2015, started producing a few last year and is loaded this year. I’ve heard it has a tendency to be biennial if not thinned well, too
Good idea on the dwarfing rootstocks. I got a tree on G41 from Cummins that had probably 50 blossoms soon as it started growing this spring. Other trees had about finished blooming when this one caught up from it’s dormant state. I probably would have let it have one or maybe 2 fruits if any had set.
Red Merylinn, Cinnamon Spice and Turner had blossoms from each bud of the freshly grafted scionwood…but I removed all the buds before any had a chance to think about setting fruit.
I am also going to have a light crop this year. I have several that are ALWAYS biennial and the rainy weather caused bad pollination on those that were not… And I had more Curculio damage that I would have liked. I posted in another thread where they started while tree were still in full bloom, I’m not sure what I’m gonna do about some of these issues. I guess I have a year to think about it.
I wish mine was a plain old Delicious, but it must be some sport or something. Even if I leave them on as long as I can to sugar up, they just are not good. (I have an ex-Son-in-law who likes them but…)
Well I have a mixed-bag in that regard. I don’t know what the rootstock is on the the semi-dwarf stuff I got from Stark’s but I have a few S/D as follows:
Macoun - S/D in ground 2014 but deer got his antlers hooked on the fence and it must have made him mad… I had a trail cam pix of the perp, but anyway I had to lop it off and so it’s on the comeback trail. Not shocked - it’s still a pup.
StarkSpur UltraMac - S/D in ground 2014 (I think I got an apple or two last year maybe)
Honeycrisp - S/D in ground 2008 and it’s just temperamental. Great shaped tree and all, just doesn’t perform well here I guess.
MacFree - S/D in ground 2015 - nothing so far.
Zestar - Grandpa’s Orchard calls it Semi-Standard - in ground 2016
I have a Sweet Sixteen that I have to locate the info on but it may be a standard tree, and I know the two GoldRush in ground 2013 are on Standard rootstock for sure.
So I know I can count on 4-5 trees every year that are well established producing a crop, but the others I just kinda wait on. I just can’t wait to see what Goldrush is all about, and Zestar for that matter… Maybe these odd weather things will settle down in the future… or not.
I hope my KOR is correctly labeled. However, it was only one fruit last year. I picked it in late Oct/early Nov.
I usually do the tilting test. If I tilt an apple to a 45 degree angle (or more) and the stem broke off, it usually ripens.
Sometimes, I wait until an apple drop. But that can be deceiving. My first William’s Pride dropped last week. It was unripe. Another one dropped today, I still think it’s too early.
It is a quality Sept apple in my opinion, not great but very good and different. I’m not much into Sept apples and somehow crave even sweeter ones at that time, like Sept Fuji. I start to appreciate a wider range of apples come fall. Tart, sweet, sweet tart, when apples become king I like variety. Winters are long and I fill my fridge with only late ripening apples- they are the important ones to me. Especially lng keepers.
Alan,
If you like Gold Rush, you should grow Crunch A Bunch. Never mind the name, the apple is on par with Gold Rush but not as dense in texture. (I prefer CaB’s texture). Overall, I like CaB more than GR.
CB is the early Goldrush I sent you and if it’s better it’s probably because it ripens under stronger sun. It’s pretty hard to beat an early ripening fully ripe Goldrush. Bout as good as it gets, IMO.
I now realize I need to send you some wood from what ACN sells as early Goldrush. It didn’t occur to me that it wasn’t the same as CAB. However, I don’t know if Cab is an actual early sport of GR or not but I expect that EGR is.
And when you talk about the quality of apples compared to GR, I’m not really interested in off the tree so much as after Feb. The reason I like Early Pink Lady so much is that it obtains the same texture and flavor as the original but ripens almost a month earlier. It’s a sport with the same amazing keeping qualities as the original and is just as easy to grow. .
I got my Crunch A Bunch tree was from Gurney several years ago when Gurney was the sole seller of Crunch A Bunch and Baker’s Delight (another good apple if you like sweet apples).
I’ll be interested to know what is ACN’s Early Gold Rush really is.
I ordered CAB from the same source in July expecting they’d send it the following spring, instead they sent me a twig that had been in cold storage for probably 9 months. It grew very slowly then was nearly killed by voles, but is now big enough that it would be holding a nice crop if it was nearly as precocious as Goldrush. It is the tree I sent you wood from- silly me. I wish it had occurred to me it was a different variety. I would already have grafted it on an established tree.
