Two year ago, I bought a multi-grafted apple tree from a local nursery with grafts of McIntosh, Yellow Delicious, Cortland, Spartan, and Summerred. I love McIntosh and most varieties bred from it, so that was why I bought it. I looked up and read about Spartan and Summerred since I was unfamiliar with them, but couldn’t find much information about Summerred other than the fact that it was bred from Golden Delicious and McIntosh. I thought little of that graft/variety until now.
Fast forward to a couple days ago, when I got to taste a Summerred apple for the first time. I didn’t realize it would ripen so early (though I really should have with a name like Summerred ), so I was pleasantly surprised when I noticed the apple on the ground under my tree.
This apple is really good! It’s quite tart, which I like, and very flavorful. It is definitely apparent that it has Mac parentage, having a similar vinous or berry-like flavor. But it is a bit brighter in flavor than Mac, much like Empire(maybe my favorite variety that I’ve tasted so far). I like to describe Emprie as tasting more bright/cherry/berry-like rather than the deeper grape/wine/berry taste of Mac. It’s a bit more tart than Mac or Empire and tastes kinda like a cross between Empire/Mac and Pink Lady, with some of that tart apple candy flavor that I associate with Pink Lady.
The texture is soft and smooth, softer than a Mac, but not mealy. I guess that is to be expected from having Gold D and Mac as parents. It did have a nice snap to each bite though.
Anyway, sorry for the long post. I can find so little information online about this variety, so I thought I’d share my first impressions of it. I’m quite impressed with this apple, especially since it’s an early Mac type with a strong and tart flavor. I will definitely have to try grafting a few scions or buds onto some wild apple trees around my property in the near future.
Is anyone else growing or familiar with this apple? I’d love to hear others’ opinions and experiences with it. I did read, recently, that it doesn’t do well in places with really hot summers since it can get overripe quickly in hot weather.
Summerred is a very tasty apple, and does well here in zone 3 if topworked to a hardy stembuilder apple tree. It will do well on its own trunk in zone 4. Many folks who have tried it up here in Alberta will say words like “wow, this may be the best apple I have ever tasted”. It grows best in areas without excess summer heat, and it likes cooler nights in August. It is a hobbyist apple here, meaning only for topworking on a hardy tree.
That’s the type of information I was looking for! Thanks! Is the soft texture normal with this apple? It has been hot here lately so I wouldn’t be surprised if that affected the texture a bit.
That doesn’t sound too bad then. I do not mind a tart apple, especially for cooking. We get a lot of hot weather here in August and not such cool nights either. So maybe it would become overripe too fast here in Ohio. Other than that issue it sounds like it would have been a great apple to try here.
Here Summerred is a very crisp apple, almost the same texture as Honeycrisp. It only gets soft after long storage. But again, it likes cooler weather than what you get, especially at night.
I planted a multigraft apple tree with Summerred in 2015 and despite it setting a few apples over the years the deer have decimated my apples. So I’ve never gotten a chance to try it. I’m going reinforce my fence next spring in an attempt to thwart the deer problems Ive had and hope to someday try it.
discovered this apple as a lady down the street was growing it in her front yard. I was able to try a couple and I was very impressed with the flavour and texture of this early ripening apple. The apples were very crispy, with quite a lot of juice. Similar texture to a honeycrisp. It had a nice balance of sweet with just the right amount of tart. I will definitely be grafting this variety next spring! Zone 8b.
Looks and sounds like a great apple to have in your orchard. I am still not sure if it would get too mealy too quickly here in my location. Maybe grafting a branch or two on one of my trees would be worth it to try out.
I bought this tree on the advice of a local nursery that knew nothing about it (or anything else for that matter) & that I would never visit again.
That said, the deer were pulverizing the tips & central leader as on most of my trees as I started so many projects I can’t keep up.
So I dug it up & moved it closer to my house in my east orchard. in the fall of 2024. This year, as small as the tree is, I was surprised to see blossoms & (5) apples start to form. I thinned to three as several were touching & left them develop. One fell off, I ended up with two.
When they were ripe, I picked them & ate one. I also shard some with my nieces. We all agreed that the very first thing that hit us was a very pleasant honey taste that I’ve never tasted, especially in these trash things sold at the supermarket.
Long-winded story short. If this year is any indication, I will be happy that dolt sold me this tree, very tasty!
P.S I did not find, in my area & conditions, any of the quite tart flavor, some, but not a lot…
I really like Summerred. It’s a very productive and precocious variety that I can always rely on to produce well. The fruits tend to be on the smaller side, but that could be do to it wanting to overproduce every year. The texture is good and fairly crisp when picked when ripe. I let them hang too long that first year. I still think the taste is somewhere in between McIntosh and Pink Lady. Very flavorful. It is fairly early fruiting but also one of my first apples to start blooming and is quick to start producing fruitlets. The problem with that is that it is the first apple to start getting hit by plum curculios and tends to be one of the hardest hit by them. I need to have good timing with my sprays to prevent a lot of damage, though it produces so much fruit that I can be aggressive in thinning out the more damaged apples.
I am hand ringing to see what next year brings. Because of the early deer damage, I am behind the curve on shaping it, but I’ll keep trying. I train pretty much all my fruit trees to open center but they hit it hard before I had a chance to get it where I wanted it. I need to prescribe an arrow for each deer.
I have yet to have plum curculios, fingers crossed. The bane of my existence thus far are Rose Chafers, followed by Jap beetles. I fight those things for months, but I found a quick, easy, organic recipe of death for them, so I have reduced their numbers over the last 3-4 years.
It’s nice to see some others growing this apple variety…
It’s pretty susceptible to scab and I think mine wasn’t hit too hard by marssonina leaf blotch this year, so it’s similar to McIntosh in those respects. I’m not sure about other disease issues.
), so I was pleasantly surprised when I noticed the apple on the ground under my tree.
