I don’t particularly like eating apples – all the skin stuck in my teeth and bottom retainer is terribly annoying. But I do love our homemade applesauce.
It was not a particularly good year for apples. Partly it was an ‘off’ year for the two established trees we have, but mostly it was the late spring frost we had, which kills the blossoms on the trees.
Normally we have two apple harvests, the first in early August from the (?) Yellow Translucent, one of the survivors from the old orchard when we bought the farm. It makes apples fantastic for sauce – and only for sauce – which start to rot in about a week. This year, we had only a few dozen apples, whereas in a good year it has many bushels worth.
This is the second harvest, of all the late bearing apple trees that come in the winter, this was primarily from the two ‘Liberty’ trees in the new orchard.
State of the Orchard 2019:
Two established trees – Yellow Transparent and Fireside- or so they are believed to be. Yellow Transparent lost a major branch this year in a storm.
New Orchard – Early Harvest, Liberty, and Black Oxford Apples – also some struggling pears, cherries, and a peach
Grafted – nine Bud 9 rootstock with a mix of Sansa, Belle de Boskoop, Sweet Sixteen, and Black Oxford grafts (many grafts failed, and the trees have since been moved, hard to tell which is which). Red Boskoop is a twig of scionwood I have coming for next year, for any trees that have had all grafts failed.
New for 2020 (on order from Fedco Trees):
121A – Calville Blanc d’Hiver Apples (1) 1 x $30.25 = $30.25 – standard on Antonovka
406A – St Cloud Highbush Blueberries (1) 1 x $14.50 = $14.50
449A – American Hazelnut Seedling Hazelnut (1) 2 x $16.00 = $32.00
469A – American Linden Linden (1) 1 x $16.00 = $16.00
584A – ‘Goodbarn’ Elderberries (1) 1 x $18.00 = $18.00
592A – ‘Korsor’ Elderberries (1) 1 x $18.00 = $18.00
I particularly enjoyed ‘elderflower’ flavored juices in Sweden, so that’s the main motivation behind the elderberries.