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Apple Tree (2)
Celebrated displays...
Some blossom here has already been dashed by the wind and rain, so I was fortunate to have already photographed the Cherry for another day, and also the Quince which, like the Apple is at its best at the moment. Note, though, how regions and climates change as indicated by the dates below, differing by six weeks, of the Apple Blossom Festivals in Washington State, California, Virginia and Nova Scotia, Canada.
When I see any fruit tree in blossom at this time of year I can tell what the fruit will be but not the variety. One way would be to look up the A-to-Z of apples recorded in the United Kingdom at the National Fruit Collection at Brogdale Farm, Faversham, East Kent, which includes 1,867 varieties from "Abbondanza" to "Zomer Delicious" as well as 94 Cider Apples and 65 Ornamental Malus / Crab Apples. The Apple Collection is thought to be the most comprehensive authenticated collection of varieties in the world and is therefore an internationally recognized genetic resource... and there are 18 other types of fruits and their many varieties listed too!
How times have changed though. In the weblog of 26th August 2005 describing my collection of Citrus Fruit Wrappers (including a few rarer ones from English apple and pear orchards collected from local market stalls in the early 1960s) I wrote that...
Journalist and broadcaster George Monbiot in his revealing article, "Fallen Fruit - An insane European ruling will be the final straw for the English apple" published in The Guardian in 2004 said,
"...last winter, I wanted to buy some fruit trees. I had a copy of the "Fruit and Vegetable Finder" published in 1995. It listed J.C. Allgrove's as the last of the great nurseries of the Thames Valley. In the 1940s it kept 1,000 varieties of apple tree, and in 1995 it still sold 250. I rang the number in the book and a woman answered, "I'm sorry dear, we've closed."
It is worth bookmarking Monbiot.com for his challenging coverage of both home and international politics as well as other important and current concerns.
For those on the other side of a different pond at this time of year there's the opportunity to plan visits to the Washington State Apple Blossom Festival held between April 26th and May 6th...
And on April 28/29th the 61st Sebastopol Apple Blossom Festival in Western Sonoma County, California...
With the 80th Shenandoah Apple Blossom Festival at Winchester, Virginia (75 miles west of Washington DC) from May 1st to May 6th...
Followed by the 75th Annapolis Valley Apple Blossom Festival between May 30th and June 4th - billed as a springtime celebration of their traditions and agricultural heritage... the aim being to promote the best family event for all Valley communities and visitors making it the leading festival in Nova Scotia, Canada.
Here in France one sees many examples of the closely related Crab Apple dotted along country roads... basically the original wild stock from which many varieties have been cultivated over the centuries for cooking, eating and cider making. The Romans cultivated the apple and Pliny spoke of twenty-two different varieties; John Parkinson in his "Paradisus Terrestris" (1629) listed fifty-seven; and John Evelyn in the preface to his "Pomona" (1664) wrote,
"It was through the plain industry of one Harris, a fruiterer to Henry VIII, that the fields and environs of about thirty towns in Kent were planted with fruit from Flanders to the universal benefit and general improvement of the county."
It was also at this time (1650s) that Samuel Hartlib, Cromwell’s Minister of Education, spoke of "...two hundred sorts of apples." So there you have it... a prolific fruit greatly varied and valued.
Much later, but still a century and some ago Kate Greenaway was creating exquisite drawings from life and nature (it is said she had a photographic memory) which were used to illustrate books widely popular in Britain and America and which are still selling today. I mention her in context here... one such illustration, "Baby Sleeps in Its Cradle Among the Apple Blossom...", is available below...
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