Home scale apple breeding project: 2023 cross pollinations, and 2022 seedlings
Hello again!
I thought it was time to do an update on the seedling produced from last years cross-pollinations!
Dorsett Golden x Cosmic Crisp
Dorsett has proven to be easily the lowest chill apple from the orchard, going dormant for less than 2 weeks (~100 chill hours!) but is soft even when picked fresh, and Cosmic Crisp is a high chill hours (800-1000) but super crisp and long keeping. Seems like a no brainer!
I'll be watching this little guy very closely to see if it keeps it's low chill heritage.
Tropical Beauty x Ares (?)
Tropical Beauty is reportedly around 100 chill hours (I can confirm it's low chill, but it doesn't leaf out immediately when it's chill is achieved, so not sure the exact value), and has the most intriguing flavour, it's a little bit vanilla, it's a little bit pineapple, it's a little bit coconut, it's almost like a really weak piña colada!
It's sort of hard though, not crisp... Hard. and lacks much acid which I feel diminishes it's flavours, and Ares (Redlove Era x Gala) has a lot more acid, as well as some of the berry flavours the Redlove series have, as well as a vibrant pink colour to the flesh, and a super crispy texture that breaks up well as you chew.
I had wanted to make red fleshed Tropical Beauty crosses in the future, but was more focussed on columnar crosses (Herald, and Harmony, but Waltz, and Polka too), but none took this year, and I was gifted these four instead!
These are technically OP, but as it bloomed when only Ares was blooming, and is planted close enough for the branches to nearly touch, I'd say it's a fair bet it was Ares.
Polka x Magnus
This was another open pollination, but Polka literally sits underneath the branches of my Magnus tree, and both flowered together, so the changes of it being Redlove, Huonville, or Ares is pretty low.
Polka (aka Trajan) is one of the first gen columnars, being a cross of Wijcik (Wijcik McIntosh x Golden Delicious). It's not as complex a flavour as some of the newer gen Czech columnars, nor does it have the high resistances to disease of the aforementioned Czech series (Those folks really know what they're doing!), but it's got a fantastic growth habit (2-3 good solid branches that don't crowd or bunch to tightly, and grow straight up), and retains some of the vigour found in it's parents.
Like Polka, Magnus isn't the perfect apple, it's bitter pit prone, is very attractive to fruit flies, and is very sour until it's final few weeks before fully ripe, but has deeply red flesh, has a great natural vase shape, and is very precocious, so I'm still excited to see what comes from these two, as I'd hoped to get a better columnar red fleshed apple than Maypole at some stage, and this is a happy accident!
Sweet Cheeks x Huonville Crab
Sweet Cheeks is a super tasty little crab apple, growing only around the size of a large cherry or small plum, but has a nice clean flavour and a crisp texture, which I thought would be complimentary with the Huonville Crab, as Huonville is a little larger, and very tannic, hopefully I can get a really interesting snack apple from this!
Prinzen Apfel x Redlove Era
Prinzen is a gorgeous semi-russet, with a balanced flavour and a flat shape (that I think is amazing) but is noticeably prone to scab, so adding some red flesh and scab resistance via Redlove Era sounds like a fun idea.
SG-002 x Herald
2022 was the first year that SG-002 (Ambrosia x OP) flowered, I had some spare Herald pollen on hand so quickly dusted some on to make sure the fruit grew.
I'm not sure if these will be good or not, but Herald is a good second gen columnar, and SG-002 was a pleasant apple when I tasted the apples these seeds came from.