North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Alan Haigh <alandhaigh@gmail.com>]

The matter of the quality of the Liberty apple has come up again lately on list and I always enjoy putting in my 2 cents, being excessively in love with my own opinions.

 

I believe that this apple has lost in the court of public opinion as far as becoming an important commercial apple, at least here in NY state.  Growers just haven't had that much luck marketing it- not that it doesn't have its fan base.  There are always some who consider it to be a great apple and I envy those people in a way because it is such an easy one to grow- a reliable annual producer with great disease resistance.

 

In my business, where I grow, install and manage bearing age fruit trees, my customers enjoy the reliability of Liberty's crops and how the fruit can sometimes be cosmetically perfect without a single fungicide spray.  Its scab and car resistance are well known but I have also found it to be relatively resistant to fly speck and sooty blotch on some sites.   However, only a few of my customers consider Liberty one of their favorite apples.

 

I hate the way the tree grows because of its branching habit- it just doesn't put out very much small wood and it is a difficult tree to manage in an efficient shape, anyway, it's an ugly sucker.

 

In my nursery I continue to grow Liberty, but most of the trees have another variety grafted to it just because I don't like to sell varieties that don't at least produce some apples I enjoy eating.