County heritage of apples worth preserving

Crandles Orchard was located along the shore of East Lake near Cherry Valley, I understand.Preserved stencil has lost some of its detail. Donald McClure photo

By Donald McClure
One of the lingering memories of this autumn and autumns past is our annual visit to Waupoos to stock up on apples.  Standing in Creasy’s retail shed a few weeks ago surrounded with baskets and bins of freshly harvested apples,  seems almost to be a right of passage for County folks.  It links us with our heritage and the great privilege it affords to have such a gleaming bounty heaped in our midst.

Stencil from Empire Apples used on apple boxes or barrels. Anyone remember where they were located? Donald McClure photo

For where else can you fill up a hamper with Cox’s Orange Pippins, Talman Sweets, Snows, Empires, Northern Spies, Crispins,  and of course McIntosh and many others and smell the fragrance of Ontario apples straight off the trees.   The mouth starts to water just thinking about the tart sweetness of one of these crisp apples on your tongue.

This is what County life is all about.  This is the produce of our  soil and the promise of our heritage.  But gosh it has to be looked after by all of us — including the government.

Stencils were made from brass, galvanized steel and zinc. This collection found locally were for Cox's Orange Pippin ( Benjamin Franklin grew early Pippins), Golden Russet, and Northern Spy. Donald McClure photo

Kindly apple fancier who grew over 160 apple varieties the late Henry Gray was a County fixture. Donald McClure photo

Harvest is also when I think of the friendly smile of Henry Gray who left us in February 2002.   At the apex of his apple-growing prowess Henry had more than 100 trees on his five acre property on Glenora Road, many grafted with multiple varieties.  In all he could list 160 types of apples including nine varieties of Russet and four of Pippins.

It was dedication like his that helped to sustain some of the rare and traditional  types of apples we still have with us today.  Too often old varieties are allowed to vanish from our orchards.   I still think of the  Red Astrachan which stood near the rocky hill behind my grandfather’s property. It produced a good crop every other year and we couldn’t wait to pick a ripe one out of the tree.  But do any of these old Russian varieties still survive in Ontario?  For Henry Gray and others like him, saving rare species was a labour of love.

Today apples are often grown for appearance and shelf sustainability.  Taste is sometimes lost  in the pursuit of appearance. When we were growing up the most popular cooking apples were Greenings (Henry grew both Bottle and Rhode Island varieties).  Today the name is seldom recalled.  The most popular Boy Scout apples in my day were Snows which appeared in barrels in the Church basement for filling our tag-day baskets.  These have been long replaced with more rugged but possibly more bland varieties.

If I could only have one apple it would likely be the Northern Spy — which I find is useful for both eating and cooking.  Some people say that they rate the short season and fickle Macoun  (cross between a Mac and a Jersey Black) as the best eating apple.

The Mac was  discovered of course by Loyalist John McIntosh in Dundas County down near Brockville in 1811.  Today, apples still remain our top tree fruit crop in Canada.  But we have to be vigilant to sustain this industry because different marketing circumstances, relatively low prices, lack of government support and imports of apple products from overseas have been eroding this industry.  In the past decade numerous orchards in Ontario have been abandoned or eradicated — the land planted with other crops.

Loyalist John McIintosh used the glorious old Snow to hybridize iconic McIntosh. This Snow from a Waupoos orchard. Donald McClure photo

Anyway, the point of this discourse today is to point out that some of the cultural emblems of our apple industry have almost disappeared from the scene.   When I originally twigged to the idea of picking up a few of the old working apple stencils from local antique shops it would appear that most of them had been snapped up and unfortunately many I would think have been carried away from  the County.  There are probably a some still lying neglected in old barns, but many simply disintegrated from over use or neglect.

Those that remain are like sign posts telling us a story of a day when the shipping of barrels of apples put our name on display in distant markets.

If you have any apple collections let us know.
Read more from The County Gardener Donald McClure