Let's Kill Some Apple Trees! Seedling Assessment and Culling. Part 1

Tasting, assessing and culling apple trees in the breeding trial rows.
Brix Refractometer. I've been happy with this one: amzn.to/3saJLan
Support on Patreon, / skillcult has been critical in keeping me experimenting and making content. If you want to help me help others, this is probably the best way to do it. Thank you Patrons for supporting the mission!
Donations can also be sent via PayPal @: www.paypal.com...
Buy less, but buy it through my links! Shopping through my affiliate links generates revenue for me, at no extra cost to you, click links here, or go to my Amazon Store page: skillcult.com/a... But seriously, buy less, do more.
Standard gear I recommend. I either use or have used all of it.
Council Tool Boys Axe: amzn.to/3z0muqI
Bahco Farmer's File: amzn.to/3Hbdhij
King two sided sharpening stone: amzn.to/32EX1XC
Silky f180 saw: amzn.to/3yZzM71
ARS 10 foot long reach pruner: amzn.to/3esETmM
Victorinox grafting/floral knife: amzn.to/3Jki1E9
Wiebe 12” fleshing tool: amzn.to/3sB0qSl
Atlas Elbow Gloves: amzn.to/3FwB5g6
BOOKS:
The Axe Book, by Dudley Cook: amzn.to/32kx7sN
Bushcraft, by Mors Kochanski: amzn.to/32q2rpT
Subscribe to my channel for more insightful Self Reliance related content: www.youtube.com... Click the bell icon to be notified of new content. Subscribing doesn’t mean that much on it’s own.
Blog and website: www.skillcult.com/blog
Instagram and Facebook @SkillCult

[@primoculturefarms]

This is the elite level video we've been waiting for. Can we just band together already and get this man a 100 acres on a mountain somewhere and 2 assistants. Imagin what he could do.

[@sempi8159]

If it were possible it would have already happened...

[@SkillCult]

I'm working on it. I seem to be making gains in my health, which could make all things possible. I will be able to afford at least a mountain property, just hoping to get something I'm worthy of, not some dry hillside with thin mountain soil.

[@joshua511]

I can't buy him 100 acres but I'll try to get scion wood from him next time.

[@jonf2086]

I feel like one of the candy apples could be called “jolly brancher”

[@SkillCult]

That's awesome lol. I have definitely though jolly rancher and even tried to think of names that are a play on that with no luck. I might use that! Good one. Not the new columnar tree though, it is not branchy enough ha ha. Maybe some offspring of that and hard candy cider...

[@elkhound25]

Mad apple breeder scientist + caffeine = longer videos = win win for viewers !

[@Tmakepeace]

I'm getting out my engraver to rename my Flaxen to Pink Lemonade. Thanks for the update.

[@Scrial]

Patch notes IRL.

[@lemagreengreen]

Wow the Pink Lemonade... I want that tree!

[@SkillCult]

It is pretty nifty. I think we can do better in the long run, but it's a fun and tasty apple. I think I have quite a few scions this year. Shouldn't be too expensive or anything.

[@steveford9294]

This is great dedicated work, a treat for apple lovers. He is the kind of apple breeders we need , open source and in the public domain. Very good video that sparks curiosity and passion.. keep it up ,

[@saltriverorchards4190]

Thanks for letting us know about pink lemonade being susceptible to sunburn. That’s very helpful because now I will set the trees up to allow more smaller branches above the scaffolds to hopefully provide some shade on the fruit. I usually open my trees up to maximize sunlight. I will treat these a little differently.

[@SkillCult]

It may not be a problem in some areas. Here it is a big problem.

[@stephenluna7932]

Glad your energy levels were better, the cat co-star appearances was fun. Fun to nerd out about the apple varieties from your apple breeding.

[@newfoundlandrules]

Super detailed apple breeding project video AND cat footage? What more can we ask for?

[@SkillCult]

Panda bears :)

[@FlomatonFamous]

Enjoyed the video, thanks for taking us along.

[@derekclawson4236]

It's just totally awesome the work your doing. Nice special cactus too!

[@SkillCult]

A lot of those cactus are grafted to my seedling King Tubby, which as a result should be available next year.

[@derekclawson4236]

I used to have a grand thricho collection but didn't move them one winter and killed a bunch. Still have some but no longer a ton of great clones. I'll possibly grab a cutting of yours someday. Where would you make them available whenever they are ready?

[@DevaJones03]

the over scratching didnt work at all LMAO that cat was loving that LOL yall are adorable together

[@SkillCult]

Yeah, failed strategy! Insatiable I guess.

[@keepersnurserykarim]

Great video and good luck with the breeding Stephen, as a Brit I have no taste reference for the majority of the apples you bred with in the first place😅 and now it seems I'm several generations behind your latest seedlings

[@adam24817]

I'm a cider people!!! Love that you said you will serve our a bunch of cider varieties

[@SkillCult]

I'm thinking of collecting half a dozen or more of those up, giving them goofy names and providing them as an experimental bundle. We'll see. I'm at least trying to keep track of them this year so that would be possible.

[@adam24817]

@@SkillCult sounds good to me, everything I got from you last season is doing great!

[@TXVETJEB]

I watched the whole thing, so I'll wear my "Apple Nerd" label with price. Glad you had such a good year. It's been the worst year for apples here in North Texas. The near 110 degree temps day after day cooked them on the tree and almost all rotted before they ripened. There's always next year. Thanks for the video.

[@seandwyer2020]

Informative, but dense. Will need to watch a couple more times. I'm sorry about standing health issues Steven. Best to you.

[@wingama]

Awesome as always!

[@DeeSixHomestead]

My chestnut crab has the red veins in the flesh! Such a good apple! ❤

[@SkillCult]

Interesting, never seen that.

[@aussiehardwood6196]

Your apples look beautiful, like true little miracles. I'm gonna check out your site and maybe get some seed.

[@SkillCult]

seeds will be available this winter sometime. Subbing to my blog is a good way to find out when they are ready.

[@aussiehardwood6196]

Imagine being able to gift a friend or family member a big box of tasty fresh apples. That would be cool.

[@dlbuffmovie]

YES CIDER APPLE TESTS PLEASE.... :-) I only found one wild graft I wanted to try this year. Nothing else I tried this year made me go back for a cutting. I've found two for juice quantity and now looking for the flavor apples. Willing to test more, but I am in the NE.

[@travisbrock5024]

There is a Champagne apple already. Originally from a random tree in New Mexico. It now resides at Dixon’s Apple Orchard in Wisconsin.

[@SkillCult]

thanks, I looked it up already too. Been bouncing around names for TAPKAIP :)

[@tylerenloe7523]

What state can you grow cactus and apple trees outside? I’d love to know your stuff looks amazing

[@SkillCult]

Northern California and mid elevation. I'm in a zone where we get a bit of snow, hard freezes, but not too hard. Enough chill for almost all apples and stone fruits and just squeeze by with some cactus. Olives are fine too.

[@matthewmiller4209]

Applepunk Gandalf!

[@charlesward8196]

Where can I find out more about apple crossing? What do the number mean after the cross names?

[@SkillCult]

I have a lot of content on apple breeding on a small scale, but I have changed the way I pollinate a lot over the years, so it isn't really current. I hope to update the stuff about making pollinations this spring. There are various levels of care you can take to insure different levels of certaintly regarding controlling the pollinations over random pollination by insects. Pretty much what I do now is pull off any opened blossoms, put a mesh bag over the branch, then as the flowers open, open the bag once a day to apply pollen from the pollen parent. You can see stuff on collecting pollen in other videos of mine. Here is the apple breeding playlist. kzbin.info/aero/PL60FnyEY-eJAMOPvU-yyF4JfuW5ocJvC4 The numbers are year 11 = 2011 and the second number is a random number in order to tell them apart. So grenadine x gold rush 11/2 is #2 of that cross, of however many. The convention is that seed parent is listed first and pollen parent second.

[@MrChickadee]

for the NERDS!!!!

[@nateb8245]

I’m an apple nerd. Perfect video.

[@gitgud6310]

Amazing!

[@averagejoetr3373]

My cherry crush did extremely well after being grafted on an older tree and then died the first winter. I have no idea why. The rest of the tree looks great. Zone 5b, Denver CO

[@SkillCult]

Bummer. it looks pretty healthy and vigorous here.

[@saltriverorchards4190]

Bummer. I hope mine doesn’t die. I grafted my cherry crush onto a 6 year old mm111 this spring. It grew like crazy. Looks great right now.

[@bregbert4313]

I got a sweet 16 from you, grafted in March 2023. It produced 1 apple I ate oct 10 awesome apple.

[@SkillCult]

Glad to hear. It can be amazing. Here it has been so all over the place quality wise that I'm sort of giving up on it to grow for eating. I get a good year only every 4 or 5 years. I hope it is more consistent for you.

[@bregbert4313]

I m in central utah. It had water core. Tasted like fresh squeezed apple juice.

[@justin1730]

I had some brown spots in my apples this year that I attribute to both heat and bugs that got into them. We were hit with 90+ weather early this year, so I did not bag them as usual. Lost most of the crop, but I did not lose 3 hours bagging apples. My apples tend to sunburn worse in bags than out. Are you sure the browning around the core is not from coddling moth? P.S. The video is totally watchable at 1.5 speed. I pause and rewind for interesting details.

[@SkillCult]

Mine sunburn worse in the organza bags, but not white paper. but they also don't ripen well in paper. We get days at or over 100 every year and many mid to high 90's. I would not be surprised if it is heat related but I'm not seeing it in other apples.

[@marklam8548]

Your 90 variety test tree may not be a very precocious root stock... So I'm wondering what rootstock is that.? And the obvious rule for a test tree is get one that is quite precocious.😮😅

[@SkillCult]

I don't know, it was already here. it is at least a semi dwarf like M111 size, but probalby standard. could be clone, could be seedling, probably a malling clone.

[@furyxan]

Why are you moving? You have such a wonderful homestead there.

[@SkillCult]

My ex moved back and won't sell out to me. Not enough room for everyone and space to expand projects.

[@mdl17576]

I'd be interested in trying out Grenadine x goldrush 11/5. I make cider and the description you gave sold m. Plus that yellow skin with neon pink flesh, wow 0_0 I would also be on board for an experimental cider mix. It seems like your use of Grenadine has created a lot of good cider candidates. On that note, I just sqeezed a Sugarwood onto my refractometer - 16 brix. It's been a damp summer here in NY so not surprised it is coming in low. Not much acid or tannin but definitely picking up the savory character under the sweet. Highest brix for me so far was Hewes Crab at 18. 14 seeds from a Hewes x Sugarwood cross :) Finally, earlier this season I tasted a Pristine and if I hadn't watched your videos wouldn't have had the right words to describe it - musky was 100% accurate. Had never run across it before but wow, it's real. Thanks for the detailed vid! Oh wait. Triceratops. Two years ago it sounded awesome. One year ago, not so much. What's the verdict this year??

[@SkillCult]

I have never seen GRUsh x GREN 11/5 with that much pin flesh. Almost like I mislabelled something. I think 11/10 and Vanilla pink might be more interesting, redder, more pink, more berry flavors, more tannin, more acidic probably too. The tannin in Grenadine really comes through, often higher even. Sugarwood hangs late and is far from ripe here. You might let it hang or ripen off the tree a while and test again. My sugar levels here are insanely high, so you can't compare to my numbers in new york in any year., let alone with extra water. I had probably tasted that musky thing before and not had a name for it. Once I got this really musky apple, I had to figure it out and name it and now I'm tasting it more often. That apple by the way we'll get to in the next round and it is still very musky and promising. It has to be a new apple classification! Triceratops is probably not ripe. I'll hit it in the next round and see.

[@mdl17576]

@SkillCult GRush x Gren 11/10 and Vanilla Pink both sound very promising, my only concern about those is that they may not ripen before the season here ends. I'd say anything later than Nov 1st is not going to finish some years. GRushXGren 11/5 and Maypole x Chestnut may be better bets from the climate angle. That said, if you're still offering them in a year or two I'll try them, but better to let the people with a bit longer season try first. I was probably over optimistic in trying Sugarwood, but this year at least, I think its got at least another week to ripen. I harvested a few early because they were controlled pollinations with an unidentified red Fleshed crab of high flavor I found growing in the neighborhood. The apples fell off and were hanging in the organza bag (thanks for recommending those) so it was time. Half a dozen left hanging if the darn birds will leave them alone. Got some seed from crosses with sugarwood this year x Williams Pride, x Hewes, xEnterprise as well. Hoping for earlier ripening with the xWP and xHewes crosses.

[@alancole1394]

Someone get Steven an assistant.....STAT. 😜

[@MaluseedGrowers]

Ice princess looks nice.

[@SkillCult]

it was probably the most compelling apple that day as far as something I wanted to keep tasting and eating. Very nice porcelain like smooth skin and complexion, aside from the scab.

[@MaluseedGrowers]

@@SkillCult Nice, one thing I started to notice when growing apples tree, you start to be begin to notice each varieties has its own unique leaves. Especially, Williams Pride & Liberty.

[@SkillCult]

Some do really stand out as different. the trait of high variability seems to reach into almost every aspect of the trees. @@MaluseedGrowers

[@AceFace50001]

What song is that at 43:19? Sounds vaguely familiar.

[@SkillCult]

Fuck Up's, Get Out, FU '82 EP A sleeper of early bay area punk.

[@saltriverorchards4190]

Do you happen to have the parentage of cherry crush? I don’t have it in my notes.

[@SkillCult]

It has to be Cherry Cox x Grenadine, or vice versa.

[@saltriverorchards4190]

@@SkillCult thank you

[@orichalcumaes8404]

How about spritzer as the name for the formerly ice princess.

[@SkillCult]

Damn, that's a good one! I'll put it in the short list.

[@BRIANLIMBARO]

Nice

[@Kommunist_Kittens]

Now this is that premium content. It's like being at femboy Hooters and they have fresh scalloped potatoes. Truly divine. I miss my wife....

[@DjapDude11111]

Wtf

[@soronos8586]

Where do you sell your trees?

[@SkillCult]

At this point, I sell seeds, pollen and cuttings for grafting, so no actual trees. They will be available eventually through me or other nurseries. In the meantime, you have to graft them, or I may make bench grafted trees available at some point too. Grafting is relatively easy to learn. You just need any apple tree or apple rootstock to graft onto. If you have a tree already, you can graft onto it. most cuttings are sold on my webstore www.skillcult.com/store and the ones I have very few of, or new stuff usually auctioned on www.figbid.com that happens late winter

[@rossmcguinn2256]

Do you ever use any sprays? I planted some fruit trees 3 years ago, and they're beginning to produce some fruit, but I get lots of brown spots and bad fruit. It doesn't bother me, but everyone on the internet says you have to use sprays. I'm pretty firm against that as I can only assume there are unavoidable health risks in spraying, but I'm completely ignorant on the subject. I'd rather eat spotty apples than die of cancer, but I'm too early in this thing to really see what the impact of not spraying will be on yields, most of my trees haven't produced fruit yet.

[@SkillCult]

You may not have to use chemical sprays. there are lots of less dangerous alternatives for many problems. I don't spray at all, but my climate is very low disease and pest pressure. that is one of the reasons the apple areas of washington are so good, is it is a dry desert like climate.

[@projectmalus]

If you live in a commercial apple growing area it might be required for you to spray, I've heard. The spraying itself is hazardous since it might be windy or the applicator isn't trained, doesn't have protective gear, or the groundwater gets polluted. I don't spray and it wouldn't work to grow apples commercially in the east as no spray, so I'm trying pears which also can be picked green to avoid the bears :) and taste better than apples arguably, more like peaches. Less disease with pears.

[@projectmalus]

Also cleaning up under the trees will go a long way to avoid nasties.

[@Jay-tk7ib]

What do you use Saffron for?

[@SkillCult]

In rice, soups, curries, fish, chicken, kind of wherever it seems to fit I guess. Good in chicken soup, but alway measured. It is easy to over do it, or under do it too.

[@Jay-tk7ib]

@@SkillCult Thanks.

[@KiltPatrick]

Is there a reason you're keeping the "mot exciting" ones? That just says to me "more work, more effort, more mental notes for no pay-off", and I'd cull it.

[@SkillCult]

Because it takes a while for them to come into bearing the best fruit they are going to. I"ve almost culled stuff that later got named and propagated, so just being cautious. Also the conditions are bad in there. As I thin them out and tidy up, they might produce much better fruit. If I knew for sure that they are very mediocre I would be more likely to cut them out.

[@jonf2086]

@42:52 😂

[@СерджиоБевз]

Golden rush 1110 ...super healthy...😊❤❤❤like

[@SkillCult]

It does look very healthy and vigorous. I didn't mention it, but the apples look blemish free, so it probably inherited gold rush's scab resistance too. It has some of the edgy, tannic and other flaws of grenadine to some degree, but it still may have its uses and potential for breeding improved, hopefully scab free red fleshed apples.

[@thartwig]

Doctors must hate this man.

[@abcabc39]

Browning inside is a calcium issue

[@SkillCult]

whatever it is, that apple has an issue on at least three different trees.

[@remip6539]

2:40 : bitter-pit ?

[@SkillCult]

No, bitter pit is small deep spots. This is more of a general browning effect. Strange. Very probably physiological since it is showing on more than one tree. It doesn;t seem to affect eating quality or flavor much.

[@СерджиоБевз]

I liке on 7.30 sek...Rubio× king david 145 ..❤❤

[@jeffreydustin5303]

Kill not graft?

[@SkillCult]

Can't keep them all. the good ones get grafted for replication.

[@matievski1]

Seedlings take 15-20 years before they start to fruit. Those looks like are grafted young trees.

[@primoculturefarms]

Up here in the north I find it's about 7 years to fruit on their own roots. But nowhere near 15 to 20. And his are grafted over to dwarf rootstock.

[@SkillCult]

I have not grown many on their own roots, but I would also think that is a bit on the long side. The ones I have fruited under very stressful conditions have fruited in 12 years or less, but not all have either. These are all on dwarfs, bud 9, M9, Padjam and one of the geneva in that size range. I have fruit from about 4 years at the very earliest to 10 years, average maybe 6 or 7 ish.

[@owendavies8227]

Those brown spots look like a boron deficiency or excess. Get your soil tested.

[@SkillCult]

I do have a trace mineral soil test from when I first moved here. Pretty sure it was low in boron, but it has been a long time. I've made some adjustments. Whatever it is, it seems specific to this variety. So maybve a bit low and this is especially susceptible. someone else said calcium.

[@owendavies8227]

@@SkillCult It's possible calcium might be an issue as well, but ALL of your apple trees show signs of boron and iron deficiency in the leaf pattern even if they don't show up on the fruit themselves. Fixing the deficiencies will greatly improve quality and productivity.

[@СерджиоБевз]

I like King david×rubiат..on 39.23 sec.It's very..black❤❤❤..suреr... дякую

[@SkillCult]

it's a real looker for sure. I think it might be cider material rather than dessert material, but we'll see. I made a bunch of that cross last spring.

[@СерджиоБевз]

@@SkillCult It's baeutiful..black..