Which? Apple

[FB.]

I'd still love a Pitmaston Pineapple, purely because I love the name. I do also like the taste of Pineapple, which this is supposed to have. Any thoughts on it FB?

I've very nearly grown this one myself.

Like many older varieties, it's not as heavy cropping as modern varieties, but, also like many older varieties, it seems to be less demanding; coping better with minimal attention in the way of pruning, spraying and feeding.

It also tends to have the typical "old fashioned" growth habit of being fairly upright-growing but not particularly fast growing. These habits being ideal for minimising the space requirement and trouble of caring for the tree - and enabling trees to be underplanted with other useful plants.

[Cidermaker]

You need to take into account things like your own growing conditions and which varieties will suit them.
Some trees are susceptable to diseases such as canker and scab while others are said to be resistant.

I live in a warm wet area of the UK and I've been warned away from having Bramleys because of our climate and canker.

I've ordered bare 55 rooted trees to plant this winter from this company. Apple Trees, Fruit Trees For Sale, Apple Tree Fruit Tree
I've not used them before but the choice that they offer is absolutely mind boggling.

[VirginVegGrower]

I've very nearly grown this one myself.

Like many older varieties, it's not as heavy cropping as modern varieties, but, also like many older varieties, it seems to be less demanding; coping better with minimal attention in the way of pruning, spraying and feeding.

It also tends to have the typical "old fashioned" growth habit of being fairly upright-growing but not particularly fast growing. These habits being ideal for minimising the space requirement and trouble of caring for the tree - and enabling trees to be underplanted with other useful plants.

Sounds like one for me then FB. Thanks for that

[yummersetter]

I've got several Pitmaston Pineapple trees, one 20 year old standard and a couple of 5 year old bush trees. One of my favourites, but needs a sunny autumn to bring out the pineapple flavour. Its fairly biennial and at the 'on' year will carry so much fruit that it really should be thinned or you get what I have this year on the mature tree, hundreds of smallish fruits. It's a yellow rough skinned apple. As I use the apples for juicing, and I never have a day to spare on thinning a huge amount of apples, I'm happy with the small size and just keep the small bush trees thinned for dessert fruits. I pick them as late as possible to maximise the flavour, though this year they're beginning to fall a bit earlier than I'd like. The 20 year old tree is the same size and shape as Orleans Reinette of the same age. I'll take some pics later in the day.

[DuncanM]

Hmm, I really like the sound of the Pitmaston Pineapple, I'm going to see if it's not too late to add 2 to my order from Deacon's to stick in my newly acquired allotment

[FB.]

You need to take into account things like your own growing conditions and which varieties will suit them.
Some trees are susceptable to diseases such as canker and scab while others are said to be resistant.

I live in a warm wet area of the UK and I've been warned away from having Bramleys because of our climate and canker.

Yes, selecting varieties and rootstocks suited to the variations in the UK regions can make a big difference. I generally would not recommend Bramley as it is gradually losing its disease resistance.

However, Bramley is possibly the most resilient of all apple varieties on account of its massive vigour - being so vigorous that it can often manage to reach an equilibrium with the diseases. It'll cling onto life very well even when heavily infested with pests and diseases.

Generally speaking, the least troubled varieties, when it comes to diseases, tend to be those which are over a century old, which haven't been grown in many places, which are not related to the much-inbred modern varieties, and, if possible, are triploids or exhibit the typical features of a triploid (since quite a few old varieties are now being found to be previously-unknown triploids - such as Coeur de Boeuf, Hambledon Deux Ans, Norfolk Beefing to name just a few which I grow, which are prving to be very healthy and rugged trees in less-than-ideal conditions).

[Leif]

Which? asked 936 tasters to sample 13 different eating apples last October. Obviously there are lots of other factors to take into account when choosing which apple to grow but the order of preference for taste was
Pixie 67%
Braeburn & Sunset 55%
Paradis Myra 53%
Red Falstaff & Queen Cox 52%
Fiesta & Pinova 50%
Winter Gem 49%
Cox's Orange Pippin & Gala 45%
Paradis Lummerland 38%
Redlove Era 23%

I, for one, won't be buying Redlove

Utterly pointless, like so many Which reports. Just look at what sells in the supermarkets, the apples are awful. Where is the Egremont Russet? A gorgeous apple, in my opinion. And that is my point, why should you have the same tastes as me? I love sharp sour apples. Most people don't.

[northepaul]

Thats why we should do our own poll!

[yummersetter]

Pitmaston Pineapple Photos

This is the tree that was planted in 1991, probably M25


Thought you might like to see the colour co-ordinated lichens on the branches on the southwest side. There's some green algae staining on quite a lot of the fruits this year, on account of the persistent rain.

This is from the bush tree, showing the surface texture

[yummersetter]

Just tried a Pixie apple as it had fallen off the tree and got bashed. Hideously unripe still.
I planted it because I fancied selling bottles of Pixie Juice.

[orangepippin]

Which? asked 936 tasters to sample 13 different eating apples last October. Obviously there are lots of other factors to take into account when choosing which apple to grow but the order of preference for taste was
Pixie 67%
Braeburn & Sunset 55%
Paradis Myra 53%
Red Falstaff & Queen Cox 52%
Fiesta & Pinova 50%
Winter Gem 49%
Cox's Orange Pippin & Gala 45%
Paradis Lummerland 38%
Redlove Era 23%

I, for one, won't be buying Redlove

I thought I knew a fair amount about apples but have to admit to not having heard of the two Paradis varieties in this poll. Several of them are quite difficult to get hold of - these are certainly not the top 13 most readily available in shops or purchased as trees in garden centres. Our local Sainsburys only has 3 of them ... but it also has Pink Lady and Golden Delicious, both very widely available and very popular, surely they would have to be included (even if they may not rank particularly well for taste).

If taste was the criteria for selecting the top 13 then they seem to have missed out many well-regarded varieties such as Egremont Russet or Ashmeads Kernel or Kidds Orange Red that usually do well in taste tests, and I don't think anyone would consider Redlove in a poll for top 13 apples by flavour.

I would also with respect suggest it is quite difficult for most people to separate Cox and Queen Cox in a blind taste test, I'm a fan of both, but the flavour is very similar - hardly surprising since one is a sport of the other.

All in all, it seems to be a bizarre selection to choose from, or maybe there was some purpose that I have misunderstood.

[veggiechicken]

I think its just the usual biased survey that tries to sound scientific but fails when put to the test! Any suppliers of Pixie will probably do very well out of it!

[orangepippin]

If this is how they test apples, it makes you wonder how meaningful Which?'s tests of washing machines and fridges are.

[veggiechicken]

Exactly!! They never seem to test the one I'm interested in
I have a report here for Blight resistant outdoor tomatoes. Maybe we should give our own verdict on these now that the season has come to an end. - I'll do it now!!
EDIT - the report findings don't make much sense
They grew the plants in Cambridgeshire and North Wales (a known blight area). then rated them on the number of fruit produced in Cambridgeshire and number of blighted fruit in North Wales I give up - the conclusions seem pointless.
The only conclusion I can see is that you can grow more toms per plant in Cambridgeshire than in North Wales.

[boundtothesoil]

Utterly pointless, like so many Which reports. Just look at what sells in the supermarkets, the apples are awful. Where is the Egremont Russet? A gorgeous apple, in my opinion. And that is my point, why should you have the same tastes as me? I love sharp sour apples. Most people don't.

I'd venture that the main problem with this kind of survey is the low level of in-house journalistic expertise on the subject. You also see this in the newspapers every autumn when they run features in the gardening sections on 'English Apples'. I've cut a lot of these out over the years, as someone with an interest in apples. Almost all contain blatant factual errors. Some can be excused on grounds of space and, thinking about it, I suppose it probably doesn't really matter if we are told that Discovery is the earliest apple of the season.