GLADSTONE A seedling that arose around 1780 and was found in a field near Kidderminster by William Jackson of Blakedown Nursery. It was introduced as Jackson's Seedling in 1868 and was subsequently renamed in 1883. An early dessert apple, often ready by the end of July, with large, greeny-yellow, red flushed fruit. The sweet, firm flesh is flavoured of raspberries. Trees have a spreading habit and are tip-bearing. Crops are good but need to be eaten quickly as the apple soon goes soft and loses flavour. Pollination Group 4
 
 
 
 
 

 

 

 

GLORIA MUNDI Also called the Monstrous Pippin or the Ox Apple. First recorded in the U.S.A. in 1804, and introduced to England in 1817. It may originally have come from middle Europe. Once very widely grown throughout Britain. A middle to late season culinary apple, very large and irregularly shaped, which cooks to a golden purée, but will keep some shape if desired. It is often not sweet enough without the addition of sugar, when the full richness emerges. At the end of the year it can be used raw in mincemeat for Christmas. Stores until December. Part tip bearing. Pollination Group 4
 
 
 
 
 
 

 

  

GLOSSY OTTER The Polecat Public House, at Prestwood, Buckinghamshire, contained several old and interesting apples in its extensive orchard garden, and we took scions of all, with the permission of the former owner, John Gamble, in 2005. Unfortunately the new owners have removed most of the trees to enlarge the car park.The fruits bore all the hallmarks of varieties planted to provide both food and cider for the old Inn’s guests. The trees were at least a century old and many very old. We have named them after the Mustelid family of creatures, such as weasels, stoats and otters! This apple is medium sized, rounded and uniform, with yellow skin almost all covered with a crimson blush and streaks. The skin is very glossy. The fruit is ripe in early November, sweet, crisp and juicy with a rich flavour. The apples will store to the year end. Pollination Group 3

    
 

GLOUCESTER ROYAL Raised around 1930 at Dursley. Probably best as a cider sweet, but can be eaten without distress and without exhuberance. A small to medium fruit, with green and orange skin, flecked and blushed with fine red. Ripe in October, the flesh is sweetish, lacking much acid, a bit dry and a little chewy. Late season, storing to November. Dark buds. Pollination Group 5

    
 
GLOUCESTER UNDERLEAF A variety known since 1883. Small to medium-sized fruit with a yellow skin, blushed amber-red in the sun. It has been said to be triple purpose but, as a dessert apple it can be a bit dry and woolly, and a bit short on sweetness, with a modest flavour. Cooking it does not improve it much. Best for cider. Mid season, storing to November. Pollination Group 5
    
 
GODFREY GRAND A lovely old apple, not matched with the DNA of others known. Beryl Godfrey and her late husband, Ray, showed us the tree early in the new millennium, at Meadow Lane, Iffley Village, their house being built in an old orchard, at the edge of the water meadows that nestle against the River Isis (Thames). There are other old apples in the immediate area, such as the Iffley Beefing and Iffley Codlin just a short distance away, all these trees seeming older than the houses they now own. This particular old tree was split on the side and decaying, the higher part being hollow. The trunk is interestingly ribbed as though sap routes are rounding off to become new trunks in future. There is also a visible ring at about 5 feet, where it might have been grafted or constricted in the past. The apples are very good. The medium to large apples are a shapely oval form and yellow with pink dots or sometimes a warm blush. Medium to large, the flesh is very tender, but crisp and not soft, pale and very sweet with a good acid balance and fine flavour. An excellent eating apple which also cooks moderately quickly to a very rich, sweet flavour keeping its shape but softening. Excellent for pies and tarts. Ripe in early October, the apples will keep well to the year end. A reliable cropper. Pollination Group 4
    
   
GODWICK APPLE Jamie Randall, on a walk along the ancient deserted village of Godwick, Norfolk, noticed a very old apple tree and an equally ancient walnut tree. Knowing of our interest in old trees, he talked to us about it in 2019, and sent wood for grafting that winter. These trees are completely out of time and place, since the village had gone by the end of the 16th century. Since then this poor and wet clay land has only been used for animal pastures. Any seedlings would surely have been grazed out by livestock and we are left with the conclusion that these two trees have survived from the 16th century. The village barely reached any size as the land was so uncompromising and by 1590 only a few houses were left, and would have been cleared to make way for a Hall and parkland started in 1586, and a Great Barn in 1597. There can have been no reason to plant them since. Godwick was an Anglo-Saxon village, near Fakenham in Norfolk. By the late 16th century only two tenant farmers occupied the land. If not planted in a villager’s ‘close’, it is possible this apple tree was planted in the orchard of the church, the last relic of which, the Tower, was turned into a folly in the 1580s. It seems unlikely that it was part of the Hall’s orchard, as the tree seems very remote from this (and the Great Barn). The Hall was abandoned in the 1830s after a fire and pulled down in the 20th century. Our tree has not yet fruited so we cannot describe it properly yet. We include the apple here for the enthusiast for ancient trees. Pollination Group 4
    
 
GOLD MEDAL The original name was Ryland Surprise and it was new in 1882, raised by Mr Troughton of Preston, Lancashire. It is for both dessert and culinary use, early to middle season (August-September), large in size and with pale golden skin, sometimes becoming amber. It was very popular in its native Lancashire and the Isle of Man, but also in the London area. The flesh is yielding and slightly acid, but juicy, crisp and sweet and with a fine flavour when first ripe. The trees have compact, dense growth. It will store until November, but by then it is starting to soften, the flavour is becoming cidery and the sweetness is fading. Pollination Group 3
    
 
GOLDEN BITTERSWEET An old Devonshire cider ‘bittersweet’ that was first recorded by Hogg in 1884. The accession in the National Fruit Trials did not accord with the early descriptions and the true variety was re-discovered in modern times by the former Thornhayes Nursery in Devon. The Herefordshire Pomona described it as – ‘a Devonshire apple, large and conical with ribbed sides. It is a yellow apple, with a red cheek, and sprinkled over with small russet dots and traces of russet. The tree bears freely and the fruit keeps well. It has a good repute as a cider apple’. Hogg says it was sent to him by Mr Rendall of Netherton Manor. The flesh is dry, woolly and slightly sweet. It bears well and ‘keeps without wasting’. Late season. Pollination Group 5
   
 
GOLDEN DELICIOUS An excellent apple, but one which has acquired a damning reputation in England, based upon the wide experience of the rubbish that was imported here from France, from the 1960s onwards. It was once extensively used in baby food, when the poor infants were not able to vocalise complaint. Grown in our climate and left to mature properly, it is a very crisp, juicy, sweet and rich apple of complex flavour. It originated around 1890 with the father of Anderson. H. Mullins of Clay County, West Virginia who bought some Golden Reinette trees which are believed to have pollinated his Grimes Golden and a chance tree established itself in a fence line. His son sold it to Stark Brothers who named it and introduced it in 1914. It came to England in 1926, when acquired by Edward Bunyard at Bunyard’s Nurseries, in Kent. Ripe from October to November, it lasts well into the winter. Pollination Group 3
    
 
GOLDEN HARVEY Known since 1600, when it was called the Round Russet Harvey. It has also been called the Brandy Apple, as it made very strong cider due to the high specific gravity of the juice. The fruit is small and uniformly golden, with thin and patchy russet. It has an intense flavour when ripe in late October, developing further when stored until March. It was a traditional Victorian dessert apple as well as a cider apple, being very rich and sweet. Spur bearing and excellent for espaliers. Pollination Group 4
    
  GOLDEN KNOB A Somerset dessert apple known at the end of the 18th century and in the London Horticultural Society catalogue of 1826. Forsyth first described it ‘The Golden Knob (from Enmore Castle), is a handsome, though rather small, Apple, of a fine gold colour, sometimes inclining to a russet. This Apple has a pleasant flavour’. The rounded, russeted (sometimes heavily russeted) apples are green-yellow in the shade, but with an orange tint in the sun. The flesh is yellow, tinted green; crisp, juicy and with a good flavour. Bunyard, in 1920, said it was popular in markets in the early nineteenth century, and still often grown in Kentish orchards. He reports a ‘distinctive flavour’. It has also been used as a cider ‘sweet’. There is another Golden Knob (medium sized and like a russeted Cox’s Orange Pippin), recorded by Taylor in 1946 and raised by Charles Ross at Newbury at the start of the 20th century. It might still exist somewhere, but the one offered here is the small, original one. Season December-March. Pollination Group 4    
 
GOLDEN NOBLE Found in an old orchard in 1820, Downham, Norfolk, by Patrick Flanagan, head gardener to Sir Thomas Hare (Hogg says Harr) at Stowe Hall, Norfolk. A middle-season culinary and dessert apple, with a deep golden skin and creamy flesh. It needs little sugar when cooked, is delicious in pies and perfect with blackberries. More interesting than the ubiquitous Bramley; by the end of the year it is sweet and pleasant to eat raw. It was widely grown in Victorian and Edwardian gardens, as it makes a decorative tree with good blossom. Also popular in Germany. Good crops, high in vitamin C. Partially tip bearing. Pollination Group 5
    
 
GOLDEN PEARMAIN An old apple first mentioned in 1727 in “A Catalogue of Great Variety of the best and choicest FRUIT-TREES That best Thrive in our Climate of ENGLAND. ……Collected by many Years Experience, Increased, and to be Sold By ROBERT FURBER, At his NURSERY over-against the Park-Gate, at KENSINGTON, near LONDON”. Accounts of this apple seem to conflict heavily with each other and it is difficult to have confidence that the few still known are true to name. The one we have retrieved from America has confused us a little by having small flattened apples one year and large oval apples the next. A good late season dessert apple, with all the right attributes and a prolific bearer. Crisp, sweet, rich and juicy. Golden skin, with a fine red blush in the sun. Ripe in October/November and lasting well. Pollination Group 4