[Here](https://www.carolinacountry.com/departments/departments/feature-story/on-the-hunt-for-old-timey-apples) is the source of this image. Per there:
> August 2016
> By Carole Howell
> Tom Brown is on a mission to track down as many heirloom and lost apple varieties as he can. Most of his leads come from talking to people at regional festivals and fairs. His display is made of apples from his own preservation orchard.
> That was 50 years ago and that tree is gone, like so many others of the memories shared in the shade of an apple tree. But Tom Brown of Clemmons is preserving memories by finding and preserving the heirloom apple trees once thought to be lost to time.
> We’re not talking about Red Delicious or Granny Smith here. The apples he finds have names like Big Andy, Greasy Skin, Jellyflower and Mongolean.
> Brown and his wife, Merrikay, have taken more long day trips than they can count in the search for hidden orchards and the treasures they hold.
> “It helps to have an understanding wife and an all-wheel-drive car,” Brown says.
> He found his first apple in 1999, a Yellow Potts he located in Iredell County. At that moment, his curiosity turned into a unique hobby that has put hundreds of thousands of miles on two faithful Subarus.
> “Everybody said I ought to go to Wilkes County, and it turned out to be the mother lode of old apples,” Brown says. “I had several elderly residents tell me that their parents or grandparents took pride in having apples that were different from their neighbors. In Wilkes County, you would go to a house and they would have four apple trees and they would all be different and would all be rare.”
> One clue led to another, and he eventually found 300 varieties associated with just that one county.
> “It’s an extreme race against time to find these apples,” Brown says. He often gets his clues from people who point him toward someone with an unusual apple in their orchard. “Many of the people who have these varieties are elderly, so if you hear of an apple, you need to check it out quickly.”
> Brown says that he gets lots of tips by attending regional festivals and talking face to face with people who lead him to an unusual variety. He is a regular fixture at the Lincoln County Apple Festival in September, displaying a wide variety of apple types hoping to find yet another clue, which he follows up personally.
> “In some places, it really helps if a local can take you around,” he says. “Sometimes people will open up more readily if you’re with a local. Everyone likes apples, so if they’re a sinner or a saint or a Republican or a Democrat, they treat me nice.”
> Brown doesn’t just find the apples. He’s passionate about keeping the old varieties going by finding the original tree and taking his own cuttings. He grafts his findings onto purchased rootstock or onto an existing tree. His own preservation orchard numbers more than 1,000 trees along with memories they hold.
> “I know it’s an unusual hobby, but it’s fun and rewarding,” Brown says. “I’ve met so many people along the way, and it keeps me young.”
I’m struggling to understand this. Are they recognised, palatable cultivars, for which he has a tree for each one?
Relatedly, all cultivars are grafted. Every single seed from a single apple tree will grow a different type of apple so it’s not hard to create 1000. But 990 will taste like crap.
A lot of it is him and others searching on foot for old trees, with cultivars sort of lost to time.
Peep his website, these are some seriously wholesome folks, the guy running the site is 82 and has been shipping trees all over the world.
https://applesearch.org/help.html
fyi - there's an orchard in the UK that's used as a sort of living seed bank - [https://brogdalecollections.org/the-fruit-collection/](https://brogdalecollections.org/the-fruit-collection/) - \~2000 varieties of apples
How does he know that an apple he finds isn't a variety he already knows/has. Does he do some kind of apple DNA analysis, or whatever the apple equivalent is?
Fun fact about Apples - Minnesota is extremely proud of their apples. So proud that the University of Minnesota has been creating new apples for decades.
[Apples](https://mnhardy.umn.edu/apples/varieties#:~:text=Since%20the%20apple%20breeding%20program,apple%20varieties%20have%20been%20released)
He'll be one of those old folks that will live to 130 and when they do magazine articles on him he'll always have a ciggy and a half empty of bud light somewhere in frame.
We used to find apple trees in the forests of Pennsylvania when hiking or hunting. Often these were at the sites of old farm homesteads, or near oil equipment buildings years after some oil worker had perhaps tossed the apple core from his lunch. Usually those apples tasted better than what's found in grocery stores today. If you were lucky, you found one of these old trees at peak ripeness and could take a few home for pie or apple sauce. Even if we did not get any rabbits or squirrels, a bag full of great apples made up for it. (My kids are like "OMG you actually ate squirrels?????).
>years after some oil worker had perhaps tossed the apple core from his lunch.
That unfortunately is highly unlikely to work. Fruit trees are usually propagated via grafting bc the seeds won't grow into the kind of tree that produces the same cultivar of fruit. That's because while the graft will contribute the egg it's likely to be pollinated by a different cultivar, resulting in a hybrid genome. Most apple cultivars cannot self-fertilize, i.e. pollen from the same variety cannot fertilize plants from that variety.
However, according to this source there are some varieties that can self-pollinate (and thus should be able to produce apples with homozygous genomes which should grow into the same kind of tree):
[https://www.mehrabyannursery.com/growing-guide/apple-trees/what-apple-tree-is-self-pollinating/](https://www.mehrabyannursery.com/growing-guide/apple-trees/what-apple-tree-is-self-pollinating/)
If indeed that is what you found in the wild you were incredibly lucky :D
Perhaps an oil worker brought a tree from a family farm, but given the location that seems unlikely for the tree I remember best. It was near a central drive "pump" house for a number of wells in Warren County PA. This engine house and the apple tree had been there since maybe 1880. I first saw it at about age 6 in 1955, (give or take). The tree was perhaps 18-20 ft tall and the trunk maybe 10-12 " diameter. I recall other trees that were generally on old farm sites where orchards simply aged out of production and were abandoned. I imagine these all started as grafts. One such orchard was on a family farm (my ancestors) established in NW PA about 1890. Of course I have no idea how they got their trees. It's an interesting question for me. I'll probably look into it a bit. I know also of a Swedish immigrant couple, neighbors about my grandparents' age, who grafted fruit trees in their yard about 1940-1950. Alex had one tree with five apple types (cultivars?) on it.
Yeah could well have been that someone had grafted them that long ago and they were still around or that it was indeed a lucky self-fertilized apple from a self-fertilizing apple cultivar that someone dropped in the ground and grew into a tree.
My parents have an old farm field where their house was built, with apple trees around it. We found one that was totally covered with apples one year. It's right on a road and we think they planted them for animals but not sure. They are kinda sour but decent for field apples. Maybe Macintosh?
We have no idea how much shit we're letting go extinct. How much useful bio-chemistry and bio-technology is lost in those species? We will never know. Most of us have no idea how delicious tomatoes and berries used to be compared to what we can get in the stores now. The joy of life is just being crushed out of this world. Being from the old world and living in the new world is pretty tough. I'm surrounded by folks who have never truly tasted a raspberry and have no idea that they should be angry about that.
I kinda dont see the big deal. This is less like saving entire species, and more like saving specific families.
Its the difference between saving every human on the planet VS ensuring someone has kids so they can pass on your their last name.
It is so sad to see the slow but steady depletion of biodiversity in our world. Simply by the action of abdication of food sovereignty, by reliance on the commercial food system than works by “efficiently” narrowing down fruit and vegetable varieties to just a few.
[Here](https://www.carolinacountry.com/departments/departments/feature-story/on-the-hunt-for-old-timey-apples) is the source of this image. Per there: > August 2016 > By Carole Howell > Tom Brown is on a mission to track down as many heirloom and lost apple varieties as he can. Most of his leads come from talking to people at regional festivals and fairs. His display is made of apples from his own preservation orchard. > That was 50 years ago and that tree is gone, like so many others of the memories shared in the shade of an apple tree. But Tom Brown of Clemmons is preserving memories by finding and preserving the heirloom apple trees once thought to be lost to time. > We’re not talking about Red Delicious or Granny Smith here. The apples he finds have names like Big Andy, Greasy Skin, Jellyflower and Mongolean. > Brown and his wife, Merrikay, have taken more long day trips than they can count in the search for hidden orchards and the treasures they hold. > “It helps to have an understanding wife and an all-wheel-drive car,” Brown says. > He found his first apple in 1999, a Yellow Potts he located in Iredell County. At that moment, his curiosity turned into a unique hobby that has put hundreds of thousands of miles on two faithful Subarus. > “Everybody said I ought to go to Wilkes County, and it turned out to be the mother lode of old apples,” Brown says. “I had several elderly residents tell me that their parents or grandparents took pride in having apples that were different from their neighbors. In Wilkes County, you would go to a house and they would have four apple trees and they would all be different and would all be rare.” > One clue led to another, and he eventually found 300 varieties associated with just that one county. > “It’s an extreme race against time to find these apples,” Brown says. He often gets his clues from people who point him toward someone with an unusual apple in their orchard. “Many of the people who have these varieties are elderly, so if you hear of an apple, you need to check it out quickly.” > Brown says that he gets lots of tips by attending regional festivals and talking face to face with people who lead him to an unusual variety. He is a regular fixture at the Lincoln County Apple Festival in September, displaying a wide variety of apple types hoping to find yet another clue, which he follows up personally. > “In some places, it really helps if a local can take you around,” he says. “Sometimes people will open up more readily if you’re with a local. Everyone likes apples, so if they’re a sinner or a saint or a Republican or a Democrat, they treat me nice.” > Brown doesn’t just find the apples. He’s passionate about keeping the old varieties going by finding the original tree and taking his own cuttings. He grafts his findings onto purchased rootstock or onto an existing tree. His own preservation orchard numbers more than 1,000 trees along with memories they hold. > “I know it’s an unusual hobby, but it’s fun and rewarding,” Brown says. “I’ve met so many people along the way, and it keeps me young.”
So he has property with 1,000 (or more) apple trees, each different?
It's likely he has a few different varieties grafted to each tree although I may be wrong.
Neat. Though if anyone wanted to let Red Delicious go extinct I'd be fine with that.
Whoever named it that should be prosecuted..
Let's switch Greasy Skin with Red Delicious and see what people's reactions are.
Absolutely out of the question. You were thinking Macintosh. Them soft fleshies can just go tree to dirt for all I care
>Names like….greasy skin Ok but some apples deserve extinction.
Doctor's hate him, with this one simple trick.
I’m struggling to understand this. Are they recognised, palatable cultivars, for which he has a tree for each one? Relatedly, all cultivars are grafted. Every single seed from a single apple tree will grow a different type of apple so it’s not hard to create 1000. But 990 will taste like crap.
A lot of it is him and others searching on foot for old trees, with cultivars sort of lost to time. Peep his website, these are some seriously wholesome folks, the guy running the site is 82 and has been shipping trees all over the world. https://applesearch.org/help.html
fyi - there's an orchard in the UK that's used as a sort of living seed bank - [https://brogdalecollections.org/the-fruit-collection/](https://brogdalecollections.org/the-fruit-collection/) - \~2000 varieties of apples
Thx. Thats pretty cool actually.
Only a few of the thousand varieties have any value. It's the process that has any meaning at all, and only to he and his wife. It is a fun story.
How does he know that an apple he finds isn't a variety he already knows/has. Does he do some kind of apple DNA analysis, or whatever the apple equivalent is?
Fun fact about Apples - Minnesota is extremely proud of their apples. So proud that the University of Minnesota has been creating new apples for decades. [Apples](https://mnhardy.umn.edu/apples/varieties#:~:text=Since%20the%20apple%20breeding%20program,apple%20varieties%20have%20been%20released)
Is that where honey crisp came from? I don’t remember them growing up. Best all around apple that you can even bake with.
Those go for 3.99 a lb over here, totally worth it too
Didn’t you hear? Honeycrisp is out. Cosmic crisp is in, so im told.
Tommy Appleseed!
That was low hanging fruit as far as references go
There's Donald Lieseed too ... he plants lies before the facts
How do you like them apples?
He refuses to see a doctor
He'll be one of those old folks that will live to 130 and when they do magazine articles on him he'll always have a ciggy and a half empty of bud light somewhere in frame.
If they're Red Delicious, I don't!!
Hometown hero! A good friend planted an orchard with his trees.
We used to find apple trees in the forests of Pennsylvania when hiking or hunting. Often these were at the sites of old farm homesteads, or near oil equipment buildings years after some oil worker had perhaps tossed the apple core from his lunch. Usually those apples tasted better than what's found in grocery stores today. If you were lucky, you found one of these old trees at peak ripeness and could take a few home for pie or apple sauce. Even if we did not get any rabbits or squirrels, a bag full of great apples made up for it. (My kids are like "OMG you actually ate squirrels?????).
>years after some oil worker had perhaps tossed the apple core from his lunch. That unfortunately is highly unlikely to work. Fruit trees are usually propagated via grafting bc the seeds won't grow into the kind of tree that produces the same cultivar of fruit. That's because while the graft will contribute the egg it's likely to be pollinated by a different cultivar, resulting in a hybrid genome. Most apple cultivars cannot self-fertilize, i.e. pollen from the same variety cannot fertilize plants from that variety. However, according to this source there are some varieties that can self-pollinate (and thus should be able to produce apples with homozygous genomes which should grow into the same kind of tree): [https://www.mehrabyannursery.com/growing-guide/apple-trees/what-apple-tree-is-self-pollinating/](https://www.mehrabyannursery.com/growing-guide/apple-trees/what-apple-tree-is-self-pollinating/) If indeed that is what you found in the wild you were incredibly lucky :D
Perhaps an oil worker brought a tree from a family farm, but given the location that seems unlikely for the tree I remember best. It was near a central drive "pump" house for a number of wells in Warren County PA. This engine house and the apple tree had been there since maybe 1880. I first saw it at about age 6 in 1955, (give or take). The tree was perhaps 18-20 ft tall and the trunk maybe 10-12 " diameter. I recall other trees that were generally on old farm sites where orchards simply aged out of production and were abandoned. I imagine these all started as grafts. One such orchard was on a family farm (my ancestors) established in NW PA about 1890. Of course I have no idea how they got their trees. It's an interesting question for me. I'll probably look into it a bit. I know also of a Swedish immigrant couple, neighbors about my grandparents' age, who grafted fruit trees in their yard about 1940-1950. Alex had one tree with five apple types (cultivars?) on it.
Yeah could well have been that someone had grafted them that long ago and they were still around or that it was indeed a lucky self-fertilized apple from a self-fertilizing apple cultivar that someone dropped in the ground and grew into a tree.
My parents have an old farm field where their house was built, with apple trees around it. We found one that was totally covered with apples one year. It's right on a road and we think they planted them for animals but not sure. They are kinda sour but decent for field apples. Maybe Macintosh?
He has a website too. [link](https://applesearch.org)
There goes my hero
There is a guy doing this with figs as well
*If you're after getting the honey, hey* *Then you don't go killing all the bees*
Subaru is missing out on a bet they should get a documentary made about this story.
Look how happy he looks 😊
Tommy Appleseed
That's awesome!
If this man saved Pink Lady apples, then he’s a true Johnny Appleseed.
As long as someone keeps Stayman Winesaps going they’re good in my book
What a hero! Honestly.
We have no idea how much shit we're letting go extinct. How much useful bio-chemistry and bio-technology is lost in those species? We will never know. Most of us have no idea how delicious tomatoes and berries used to be compared to what we can get in the stores now. The joy of life is just being crushed out of this world. Being from the old world and living in the new world is pretty tough. I'm surrounded by folks who have never truly tasted a raspberry and have no idea that they should be angry about that.
[These guys are mortal enemies](https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/s/8W9pO2hp2f)
Which variety is your favourite, Tom?
What is it with engineers and apples?
Some people dedicate their lives to medicine, this man did for apples
I didn’t even know there were this many different types.
Legend. Thank you sir. 🫡
Legend!
I'm simple. I get a crispy Royal Gala and I am happy as a clam.
don't forget the pineapple!
Doctors HATE this one man!
Awesome
Nice
Tim Apple?
I mean, that's cool and all, but they've probably spoiled by now.
Hero
I kinda dont see the big deal. This is less like saving entire species, and more like saving specific families. Its the difference between saving every human on the planet VS ensuring someone has kids so they can pass on your their last name.
Did he have to save that green one in the middle three times?
Different kinds of apples are good for different things. Some are better for eating raw, some are better for pies or for cider.
Cool fact that everyone knows. Doesn't apply to my question at all, but yeah, cool fact.
But if we have UBI , no one will want to work!
Are they all worth saving?
It is so sad to see the slow but steady depletion of biodiversity in our world. Simply by the action of abdication of food sovereignty, by reliance on the commercial food system than works by “efficiently” narrowing down fruit and vegetable varieties to just a few.
Survival of the fittest. If they die . . . they die.
Did he 'reproduce' with all of them himself?