The Apples On The Hill

Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree. —Martin Luther 

When I hike, I look for clues that tell the stories of the settlers who homesteaded the mountains. Sometimes I’ll find a lilac growing in the middle of a clearing, or a line of daffodils marking where an old yard fence might have stood, but more often it’s the remains of old orchards that tell me to search for the square indentation of a long-ago cabin floor or a tumbled foundation of rocks that marks a barn site. There’s nothing more satisfying in the middle of a long hike than enjoying a sweet, sun-warmed apple from a tree possibly planted a hundred years ago.

My own farmhouse is surrounded by apple trees in various states of decay. I know the house was built in the late 1800s, and I suspect that the trees on the hill above it were planted shortly thereafter. Many have succumbed to age, but even from their tangled heaps of limbs and twigs, they send up a shoot or two. Each fall, I find the gift of an apple dropped by the hollow tree above my studio and delivered to my doorstep by gravity.

I would like to add some new trees to the orchard, so I decided to get educated. My friend Kirk, who owns Big Fish Cidery, told me that the apple trees on the hill above my studio were planted there so cold air would flow down past them rather than settling around them. He also told me that the best time for planting here in Appalachia is early April. 

I’m planning for that planting now. I started by asking my mountain-native friends about their favorite apples. I’ve learned some interesting things. My friend Richard said his family loved one called the Crow Egg for drying. They hung screens over their woodstove and put the snits (thin slices) there to dehydrate. Other families dried them on screens placed on a south-facing porch roof and covered with muslin to foil the flies.

Richard also told me that any apples growing around the farm that were unfit to eat were called hog apples because they were gathered and fed to the hogs, while my friend Karla told me her family always used any apples, fit to eat or not, for cider. Susan said her husband loves Jonathans for eating fresh while her daughter loves Tompkins County King. My mother-in-law used to mention Smokehouse apples as a great all-around variety. Everyone I talked to suggested that I plant Early Transparent for applesauce. My husband prefers Fujis for their crisp snap and great keeping ability.

My next step is to visit the different orchards that dot the Shenandoah Valley and taste as many apples as I can. Then, in the spring when the ground is ready, I’ll know exactly what I want my orchard to hold. 

I like to imagine that a hundred years from now, a new farmwife will look at the apple trees on the hill and wonder about the people who planted them. I think I’ll write her a letter and tuck it into that hollow apple tree above my studio. From the looks of the slim trunk emerging from the shell of the old one, that tree will be around long after I’m gone.  

The story above appears in our Sept./Oct. 2018 issue.