Red Apples Mean

Red Apples Mean

Increased Income

Blacksburg - Redder than red apples have meant increased income to orchardists who market the sports of „ Delicious, Stayman, Rome and York varieties. Describing the origin of the redder than red fruit, Fred R. Dreiling, Virginia Tech extension horticulturist, told of them having been found by chance in many orchards across the country.

Observers noticed the deeper coloration as compared to apples on different trees, or even on different branches of the same tree. Realizing the deeper color would attract consumer interest, fruit men propagated the buds into seedling trees. This was the first step necessary to the production of marketable quantities of the fruit.

A sport is an individual which shows deviation from the normal. It often results in a superior product. The red delicious apple came into being as a sport and captured a profitable share of the consumers’ demand.

Sports .have been observed in apples and other fruit for the past 150 years. But their value to the industry went unnoticed until about 1920. During the following years, large numbers of apple sports were observed and cultivated.

Now, a new round of highly olored red sports, often called super-sports have been found and propagated. Many of them stem from Delicious and are better colored than the original. They fall into three types.

Some are solid red. Others show striped red where it. is difficult to get all red. Still others are apples on spur-type trees which produce heavy spurs at an early age.

Orchardists are producing the new strains for many reasons. More fancy and extra-fancy grades of fruit can be grown. Spot picking, a method used to gather early fruit, can be started sooner because redder than red apples color sooner.