North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[David.Maxwell@dal.ca]

> On Dec 14, 2008, at 8:29 PM, derry&bill wrote:

>

> I've received an email from a home gardener in Minnesota. She grew up in

> Switzerland and her father had a few apple trees. She wants to know:

>

> 1) if Glockenapfel, Belle de Boskoop and/or Cox's Orange will grow in

> zone 4?

I can't speak to the first, but Belle de Boskoop flourishes here in Southern Nova Scotia, which is Zone 5), and there are a few growers in the Annapolis Valley growing Cox's. (The Valley is generally 5 degrees warmer during the summer than I am.)  My understanding with regard to Cox's is that the limiting factor is the length of the growing season, rather than the temperature per se - it needs a long season to ripen.

In passing, the Boskoops are, for me, an absolutely outstanding apple - large, seemingly resistant to everything (including coddlers, maggots and scab - I didn't spray them at all this year, and they are absolutely clean. The taste is equally outstanding  But the crows like them. [They bounce up and down on the branches until they manage to get them to fall, then grab them and fly off to cache them.])