Help needed: We are often asked for details of availability of tree suppliers and/or propagation material for Sonya apples. If you can help please get in touch.
Apple descriptions
Welcome to our website which is dedicated to describing the flavours of apples and the origins of different apple varieties (as well as some other orchard fruits).
Check out our top 10 best apples for flavour, or top 10 garden apples, or browse our apple descriptions ....
- Grenadier
- Pott's Seedling
- James Grieve
- Cameo
- Cornish Aromatic
- Saturn
- King of the Pippins
- Ellisons Orange
- Calville Blanc d'Hiver
- Meridian
... or see our main index of apple varieties.
Apple tree nurseries and suppliers
- Keepers Nursery - probably the largest range of apple and fruit trees anywhere
- Trees for Life - one of the longest established fruit and ornamental tree nurseries in the UK
- Crown Nursery fruit catalogue
- Cool Temperate - home of the Own Root Project
- Agroforestry Research Trust - carries out research into temperate agroforestry, good range of apple and other fruit trees
Why 'Orange Pippin' ?
Our website is named after England's most famous apple variety - Cox's Orange Pippin - widely regarded as the finest of all dessert apples.
'Pippin' is an old English word derived from the French word for 'seedling'. The same word can be seen in the modern French for a nursery or garden centre - 'pepiniere'. Like many old apple varieties Cox's Orange Pippin was discovered as a chance seedling.
We welcome comments, advice, and link requests - please write to us at: apples@orangepippin.com
Apple sibling rivalry: Jazz vs Kanzi
Jazz - one of our favourite modern apples, goes up against its younger sibling Kanzi. They're both the result of crossing Gala and Braeburn. If you still think modern apples are no match for "heritage" apples, try these 21st century apples and prepare to be surprised. There's flavour to out-class many an old-timer - but so there should be, with Kidd's Orange Red and Golden Delicious in the background, and ancestry stretching back to Cox's Orange Pippin.
Articles about apples
Apple Reference information
- The UK National Fruit Collection - Brogdale
- The Royal Horticultural Society
- BBC Gardening pages
- All About Apples
- Wikipedia - apple article
- The Apple Journal
- Apple diversity
- Les Pommes de nos Vergers
- Home Orchard Society
- La Pomme.org
- Ronnie Appleseed
- UK Institute of Food Research
- Grandpap's Apple Orchard
- North American Fruit Explorers
- Laslett's Gardening info
- How to breed your own apple variety
Apples and Orchards
- The website and blog of Joan Morgan, author of the New Book of Apples, and one of the best-known figures in the English fruit community
- Stephen and Julia Hayes' personal site about their English apple orchard - full of real enthusiasm for apples
- Siloam Orchards, near Toronto - Canada's largest collection of heirloom and other apples
- Common Ground, the home of Apple Day
- East of England Apples and Orchards Project
- Gloucestershire Orchard Group - lots of information for orchard enthusiasts, applicable throughout the UK
- Michael Phillips' inspirational Lost Nation organic orchard
- National Orchard Forum - a UK group setup to pool expertise from local orchard groups around the country
- Rural Ridge orchard, in Virginia USA, dedicated to preserving old apple varieties and the local orchard heritage
- Holy Root Farm, some interesting old and new American apple varieties
Farm shops with home-grown apples
- Broomfields Apples, Worcestershire
- Tullens Fruit Farm, Sussex