TODAY IN THE ORCHARD
Today I visited Sweetsers’ Orchard in Cumberland to check out the Red Gravensteins. The Sweetser apple is a red sport of one of the most famous cooking apples in the world. There are several—or many—red Gravenstein sports. Each one has its own distinct name, such as the endangered Rosebrook of Sebastopol, CA. As far as we know, the Sweetser sport is unidentified. En route home I visited several small commercial orchards to see what unusual apples they might be growing. Late in the day I picked our Somerset of Maine and Red St. Lawrence. Both are also excellent late-summer cooking apples and are extremely rare. I have never seen an old tree of Somerset. There may be none left. The scionwood for ours came from Bill Reid who obtained it from Glen Harris. Glen lived not far from where the apple originated and died before I was able to meet him. Somerset of Maine is one example of the many varieties that would be lost forever were it not for the efforts of countless people who are attempting to save the old varieties for future generations. You can read more about Somerset of Maine in Apples and the Art of Detection, chapter 9. Red St. Lawrence is even more rare than Somerset. More on that apple in a future post.
