Still on The Trees in January, Awesomeness of Late Hanging Apples

Apples that are still hanging in edible shape on the trees in the winter time. I’m working on creating more super late hanging apples, so we can have a apples off the tree for more than half the year in some climates.

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Know what the date is but it’s like middle of January out here in the orchard late afternoon I just came out to grab an apple and eat it and I was like Wow pink parfait so good and I just thought man I should just grab the

Camera and do a video on what’s still hanging on the trees talking in general about uh the late hanging Apple project I guess you would call it which is my attempt to breed more apples that will hang on the tree into and through hopefully winter hopefully into spring

So let’s see what’s out here we’ll taste everything that’s you know worth biting into and probably some that aren’t and talk about what the future holds for those not familiar Franken tree at one point out 150 varieties of apples on it I’ve seen a 100 varieties riping on the

Tree in one single year now it’s down to about yeah around 100 varieties some broke off some died some I cut off quite a few I cut off so this is pomos anel this was discovered by Michael malus a friend of my friend Mark Albert and I’ve

Never met him but I did get a description of this and he said it was found on the Frontage Road between Hopland and Yukaya and it was up on a Hillside and judging from the size of the tree he thought the tree was very old but you know couldn’t tell if it was

Grafted or a Seedling or what usually I think of this as an apple that’s ripe in January and here we are dead in the middle of January this is a pretty flavorful Apple um over the years it’s just failed to impress me a lot of the reason is that

While there’s some complexity and sometimes like generic tropical almost flavors it really tends heavily toward banana if you’re interested in breeding banana flavored apples especially late hanging ones I have two this is one of them from the looks of this with the red Speckles and the shape and the color and

Everything it seems likely that this is a Seedling of either Grimes or Golden Delicious Golden Delicious is a Seedling of Grimes so the texture is not bad right right now it’s it’s not super crisp but it’s pretty good it’s definitely edible I think a lot of

People would if they had a branch of these they’d be eating them a lot and people would like them I think unfortunately the only Branch I have is on Franken tree which is infected with virus so I never send this out if someone wanted to breed with it I’d be

Willing to send out a Scion here and there but it’s uh I don’t like to send out infected wood you can see here that there’s apples on the tree but that doesn’t mean anything we have to meet certain criteria for a good winter hanging apple right I mean first of all

They need to hang so if it gets really windy hopefully they won’t break off in a storm but they need to be good right they need to actually ripen in the winter and be worth eating so this is a pink parfait here so a lot of what

You’re seeing on the tree here are actually just completely soft like you could take just squish them with your hand but we’re looking for the few that aren’t like that this one’s seems pretty soft very flavorful it says abanza uh this one seems soft see what this russet is

Here this thing’s pretty soft but it’s not offensive and it’s very spicy not really worth note though I think that is uh probably hunt russet or at least it’s labeled as that nope what’s this netto’s late tart no soft all right so here’s lady Williams now this I think of is peaking around

February 1st yeah at this point at least out here where also it doesn’t get a lot of sun here late in the year it’s a little harsh and Herby and edgy and it’s just not it’s just not there wow look at that that is literally black I don’t think I’ve ever seen that

It looks like somebody spray painted it kind of like those pictures of the supposed black apple there’s another one that’s almost that color so this is uh it says razor russet I don’t that’s not razor russet oh there’s a second tag here wow Hoover very flavorful fruity

Just like I like them yeah I can see those things are actually rotten inside um those green ones are um Rhode Island Greening no good these green ones right here are Newton Pippen which is this newon this almost looks like Newton that’s still edible oh it’s winter paraman probably white winter

Param maybe it’s edible but it’s not really crisp and the flavor is pretty washed out there’s really nothing nothing to report on and these little Becca’s crab are actually usually pretty good right now if they’ve survived this long crisp flavorful yellow flesh but tanic and Krabby too good genetics for

Late breeding I think I’ve crossed that with pink parfait I think I have some seedlings of that growing that cross there is one apple here that I was going to cut down and this has happened more than once like through the whole season I kept tasting it and it’s like nope

Nope not getting any better not getting any better and I think I actually cut down the analog in the trial rows of this tree and I was itching to come out here and cut this but you know one day I’m out here weeding my apple trees and

I just picked one up off the ground and bit it and I was like oh that’s actually pretty good kind of pineapple like acidity very hard um it’s just a super late ripener you know and if you pick it too early it’s just not going to be good

I’ve been juicing these a lot because they’re really they make great juice uh very acidic uh tastes a lot like pineapple wow yeah winter pineapple I’d grow these just for juice at this season they’re that good for juice but they have gone off a little bit as far

As texture goes and the texture was never great that one’s not bad it’s still kind of crisp now I’m really curious to see what it does it has a double trunk so I’m going to cut one of the trunks off as far as just me having this on the

Homestead yeah I’m actually pretty into it at this season in fact I haven’t eaten all day and uh the first thing I’m going to do is make carrot apple juice and I’m going to come out and pick some of these up to juice uh can be pretty flavorful very

Flavorful actually like a pineapple like acidity and actually a pineapple flavor it did have some water core so some of that could be a water core flavor which does kind of tend to make things taste like pineapple I don’t know what cross that is I thought it was a wixen

Grenadine but um it says grenadine X wixen it’s growing like a monster it’s like the second biggest tree out here in fact it’s probably equal to uh that one there which is really good that’s 117 that’s a grenadine Gold Rush 117 this actually looks like more like a gold

Rush cross than it does like a wixon cross so it’s probably grty next Gold Rush we’ll have some pink parfait in the tree we’re going to get to that later uh I’ve tasted that so many times in videos but really it’s just I wish you guys could taste it it’s

So good I got to get out here and pick my olives next nice day I hope to pull off a olive processing video just too much to do this uh beautiful rustic apple is January russet and this is another one where I was ready to cut

The tree down a total spitter h hard panic and then one winter uh Chris HX came down and to trade Scions and we were just walking around the trial rows and I grabbed one of these and we ate it and it was like oh yeah that’s actually

Shaping up yeah December or January and then it’s just gotten better and once I got it grafted out here onto this tree and out of those those trial rows where it’s really not happy they produce bigger apples like this and I’d say the quality also went up and now I’m like

Wow look forward to eating these every winter so this one doesn’t have an awesome texture even at its best and it’s on the you know wrong side of the hill but uh it’s very edible still especially for January not a polite Apple you know it

Still has a fair bit of tan in the skin is literally rough with russet and sharp and it get it gets your attention you know it’s not uh as like to say it’s not the for the people who like their baloney sandwich with the crust cut off

On White Bread you know it’s good though I could eat a lot of these and I’m sure I will in the future I think that might be the last one there and it probably isn’t going to get any better but I’m going to leave it for now

So one uh cool thing about this apple and one of the reasons I decided to release it is that it’s the closest thing I know to a really late hanging russet you know a true late hanging russet as I Define it which is like yes I’ll hang on the tree and it’s actually

Good and it actually ripens in the winter I have eaten these in late December so they have a pretty long season actually or they can but around here you know I think I nailed it with the name it’s it is more of a January Apple for sure pretty crisp on that one

We’ll move on once I finish this cuz I’m not wasting any of my second to last January russet here it’s pretty crisp actually but like a lot of russets it is uh coar grained it has a large grain to the flesh so in the future I’m going to

Do as I’ve done before and cross this with the highest quality russets I’m more interested in Crossing them onto it than vice versa I have a a Feeling that’s the way to go golden russet Roxbury russet Ash me’s kernel and the new one I have in that stable that I’m

Really into is Pine golden Pippen man I I had just had one last year that was really really good that’s what the future holds for January russet here’s a nicely trained specimen of Clarion previously known as ice princess look at that beautiful training Clarion is very

Precocious by the way if you graft it you’re probably going to get get fruit really fast um that’s a Seedling that had never borne any fruit before and wasn’t even old enough to bear fruit I grafted Clarion onto it and it fruited right away okay so this is Mir Pippen me

And this is an English Apple here it’s gone soft now that one’s more edible I just really haven’t been impressed with the qual eating quality of this apple here at least um it tastes like bananas a lot okay this is the Apple I call March hedge and we’re going to pick this one

Because it’s got some cracks on the top here and well Birds looks like so I found this in a hedge r at the top of the driveway the main Old Homestead site which I don’t know how old it is but all almost all the buildings are gone and

There’s just a few couple apple trees left and I’m pretty sure it’s a Seedling that just sprung up in the Hedge R there’s a good chance it’s a Seedling of Newton Pippen because uh Newton Pippen is one of the few apple trees that’s still surviving there in the field so I

Know it was growing there so I brought this down here and grafted it out hoping that it would perk up and and do something interesting but it really has kind of disappointed it’s kind of crisp but kind of foamy um which also lady Williams is

Kind of like that uh not much flavor the flavor it has is a little peculiar but look at it you know it’s still hanging on here I’ve used it in breeding already and I may use it again we’ll see I may just wait until across of this fruits

And I can see what it’s like and decide whether to continue or not I mean edible but bland kind of watery peculiar kind of harsh flavor that I don’t I don’t know what it is it’s certainly not anything anyone want want to grow but it may still be useful in breeding late

Hanging apples and here we are at the pink parfait tree one of several because I like this Apple so much that I have a bunch birds are really going to town on this there’s a pated woodpecker you know those big giant woodpeckers with the red head kind of the classic cartoon

Woodpecker it loves these apples and it’ll just come and sit here and and Peck them I had this guy helping me out here and he he walked like right from there up to here and this pated woodpecker took off out of this tree I think where it’s always hanging out and

Uh he’s like wow those things are so rare I’m like yeah here they’re kind of not so much they got to Peck they they can’t just like work on one apple and they just got to go around and Peck them all wow Chris get that tree get it get that tree

Get it get it get it get it kill it get that tree yeah pink parfait I wish everyone could grow it you can start eating these in November you know they’re they’re not the kind of potential that that they get to later but you can eat them early and

They probably would pick and ripen well if they hang so well I’ve said before it’s almost as if they ripen and then they just sit there like in cold storage on the tree that trait alone is a phenomenal trait to to have an apple that can hold like that and maintain its

Texture maintain its flavor or improve in flavor which this does all those is pretty phenomenal so like you might sometimes see me talking about one of my seedlings and I’m like you know this Apple’s great da d da but you know it’s ripe and then it’s it’s done like you

Know it Go the texture goes downhill right away after it Peaks and flavor and everything sometimes for But realize that that’s normal like that’s a normal heirloom Apple I mean that’s the average that’s the norm look at you get it you arborist I got to teach you how

To cut Scions for me you know so late in the season like this I I’ve had a few now where the texture is starting to to go a little bit um but I have had this uh in this eating condition like pretty crisp and great into Fe February before

Late in the season the the more ripe it gets the more it gets this like honey flavor and in some years it’s really just a dead ringer for honey uh this year it’s it’s pretty obviously honey to me yeah you know it’s that it’s that rich kind of

Rounded like dwells on your pallet floral honey thing that it’s it tastes like honey now there are like maybe a little bit of um kind of berry like aromatics from the red flesh but they’re not wrong some years there was more than others that’s walana it’s toast um see

If one of these lady Williams might be a little better but really it’s a little early for lady Williams so this one’s pretty damaged it might be better oh yeah that’s good as much as I may have talked this apple up to me it’s really a

Breeder it’s got a little bit of a foamy flesh uh the skin is pretty thick it has really nice uh fruity complex flavor and that has been passed on into some of the seedlings including uh probably hard candy cider probably where it gets some of of its fruity flavor but that’s not

The only flavor and there’s also like a lean meanness to it uh that’s kind of got some weird Herby flavors and kind of just it’s a mixed bag of flavors although it’s not as late I’m a little more inclined to use pink lady uh or AKA Crips Pink as a parent because someone

Already took it that step further and and refined this you know this is a Seedling that’s more like cider potential but I I hasn’t even been ripe yet when I’ve tasted it I think it’s at least close now this has a lot of what cider makers want it’s tanic puckery it’s got some

Red flesh flavor it’s got pink juice you know this is another one of many like this but this might be the latest of them but how useful is that to anybody you know making cider especially anywhere cold like this isn’t it’s just going to be green totally green when uh heavy

Freezes hit well let’s go walk the diagonal cordons real quick because uh there’s a bunch of new apples I grafted in there that I haven’t even tried yet so I don’t who knows what we’ll find probably nothing but pick one of those and eat it cuz like that’s a lot of

Leaks Pilots hanging on it’s a good winter Apple into maybe like early December maybe and then goes soft well I wouldn’t say it’s good but this is a Sundance it’s one of the co-op apples 24 29 it says no that one’s not bad the texture is really not good enough almost

Interesting okay this is Yates someone said that this was a real late hanger and it was a parent in the parentage of like lady Williams or pink lady maybe not crisp I would say it’s crisp crisp not really crisp crisp but like crisp is not a lot of flavor little

Water down I’m interested to see what it does in the future it’s not that late though it’s already gone I don’t know what these are oh wait is this Marill I bet that’s Marill yep not the first time I’ve tasted some very late Marill it is nutty some people like that

I don’t pretty late but not super light State and long hanger now hopefully this will do something different in the future but very soft no good interesting uh aromatic flavor though of like grape or something wheeler russet this has never done well you know not bad this

Year don’t eat the garbage cat oh she got a shrimp look I’m still eating it it’s a little soft not as good as January russet um as far as long hanging uh might be interesting to pick this and keep it yeah Wheeler’s russet originally sourced from Nick botner famous for

Mislabeling things so who knows but it is a russet it says wheeler russet so probably right okay Keener seedling I can never remember the name of this Apple for some reason it’s similar to Wheeler but softer you know January Russ it has both of them beat for off the tree you know

Now as far as like growing them and storing them or anything like that I don’t I don’t know but off the tree January russet FTW once I take January russet and cross in like golden russet and Roxbury and all these great russets we’re going to end up with a very late

Hanging uh Superior russet it’s just got to happen I I just don’t see how that doesn’t happen and these seedlings are actually already planted I know I have seedlings of that c those crosses already or at least I have Ash Mees and golden rusted I think I’m going to pick

Me some stuff for dinner you see that it looks like trash that’s not trash that’s scrap metal different different than trash you got to have a scrap metal p I just went in there the other day and got some stuff like a couple times recently three actually what do I go to town

Drive all the way to town to like go to the metal store and like buy a piece of metal what what what scrap metal got to have it yeah this uh whole Apple breeding project is uh been phenomenally successful honestly it just turned out to be way easier than anyone thought to

Uh breed new apples from seed in the future is bright uh releasing a bunch of new stuff this year I think I might be releasing like six new things which surprised me honestly but you know I have reasons and uh which I discuss so check out my web page for the Apple

Breeding project and it has links and pictures of the new apples and you can go read about them skill cult.com slapple breeding let’s see what should we pick here what I do is I I look for the least the ones that are least like what I actually want in a leak uhoh look

At that golers I better set a trap in here look at that look at that beautiful no dirt look M no dirt just pulling up some carrots check this monster out that bomber these been growing here for a long time they’re not woody or anything they’re perfectly good crisp juicy carrots look at

That