RESULTS OF 1996 ALASKA-GROWN APPLE-TASTING

 

by Dwight Bradley

 

The Annual tasting of Alaska-Grown apples was held at Bradley’s in Peters Creek on September 26. About 30-35 people attended, and 26 turned in scoresheets. In all, we tasted 50 apples, including 40 different varieties and 10 repeats. Almost everyone agreed that this was an excellent group of apples — better than the last, couple of seasons.

 

The winner was a Ginger Gold grown by Bob Boyer in his sheltered location in Spenard. Tom Marshall’s Oriole, a perennial winner, came in a close: second. Both of these were truly excellent, as good as apples ever get in Alaska. State Fair, 15th St. Mystery, and Parkland were close behind Norland finished in the middle of the pack (way below its usual finish in the top five), presumably because all the Norlands had long since ripened when we held the tasting. Yellow Transparent and Geneva Early undoubtedly would have scored much higher a few weeks earlier as well. This was one of the better performances of the later-ripening varieties such as State Fair, Summerred, Canada Red, and 8th & M Mystery.

 

Variety (with initials of           avg.

grower in some cases)             score

(1-10)

 

Ginger Gold BB                     8.60

Oriole                                      8.52

State Fair                                 8.10

15th St                                    7.75

Parkland                                  7.56

Summerred                              7.41

Canada Red                            7.27

Pristine                                    7.23

8th & M                                  7.17

Harris mystery                         7.04

Yellow Jay                              7.00

Bazen                                      6.98

Parkland                                  6.95

Westland KF                           6.93

Vista Bella                              6.88

Gravenstein                             6.78

Mantet                                     5.92

Unknown Knik north              6.65

10th & E                                 6.63

Whitney                                  6.57

Golden Trans.                         6.52

Red Trans.                               6.48

Rosthern 12                             6.44

Norland                                   6.33

Red Duchess                           6.31

Red Duchess                           6.28

Golden Trans.                         6.25

Jersey Mac                              6.24

Hazen                                      6.13

Heyer 12                                 6.04

Unknown huge green              6.03

Mantet                                     5.98

Root mystery                          5.96

Ginger Gold FM                     5.95

Summerred                              5.92

Heyer 20                                 5.91

Joyce                                       5.88

Westland VV                          5.87

Novosibisrki                            5.80

Adnac                                     5.78

Unknown Knik South             5.73

Westland LC                           5.38

Centennial                               5.38

Trailman                                  5.38

Unknown crab                        5.26

Geneva Early                          5.04

Yorks Greening                       4.89

  1. Trans. 4.43

Yellow Trans. HH                   3.98

Wealthy                                   3.94

Bert Gore reported to Bob Boyer that he lost quite a few apple trees last year in Palmer. He lost 100% of his trees on Antonovka rootstock, 50% on Prunifolia, 50% on Borowinka, 10% on Ranetka, and 0% on Baccatta. I wasn’t able to get in touch with Bert to get more details or verify the numbers, but I recall that he has about 3 acres in apples, mostly planted since 1993. More on this in the next issue.

-Dwight Bradley