AKApples

AKApples A small backyard home apple orchard in Wasilla, Alaska. Growing apples in Alaska for 25 years. By appointment only.

Apple breeding, grafting and selling apple trees, free seeds to encourage others to grow apples from seed to produce new Alaskan apples.

10/17/2026

The new seedling trial area also doubles as a winter over area for seedlings and grafted trees. Everything stays here until spring. These are a mix of this year’s seedlings, grafted seedlings, and grafted known apples (to be put up for sale next year).

The colored flagging denotes which rootstock they are on with each tree’s information written on them. The bright green flagging at the end of the video are this year’s seedlings that are still on their own roots. In March many of these will be cut and grafted to rootstock. Notice the large variance in growth between the seedlings.

10/12/2026

Apple seedlings are showing great diversity even within the same seed/pollen combinations. Those that have released their leaves will most likely be grafted out next year.

There is a huge amount of diversity even with the same seed and pollen parents. One thing I look for this time of year i...
10/12/2026

There is a huge amount of diversity even with the same seed and pollen parents. One thing I look for this time of year is what seedlings have turned color and released their leaves for winter. These will make good candidates to graft next year as they are showing signs of hardening off. Those that are still not releasing leaves easily will probably be passed over.

Below are some examples of the vast differences even within the same seed/pollen parents. Descriptions under photos.

10/11/2026

Extracting seeds from Rescue apples. Disinfected in peroxide, air dried, then refrigerated until ready to plant.

Rainy days are good for seed extracting…..plenty of overripe Rescues giving up seeds and seeing the light. ...
10/11/2026

Rainy days are good for seed extracting…..plenty of overripe Rescues giving up seeds and seeing the light.

10/08/2026

Trailman OP 24-1 apple seedling has been grafted to both G41 and G890 rootstock. Very vigorous growing 30” and 28” this year. Looking forward to what apples it will produce someday.

One of the seedlings I’m excited about I’ve shared on occasion before. Trailman OP (open pollinated) 24-1 was grown from...
10/08/2026

One of the seedlings I’m excited about I’ve shared on occasion before. Trailman OP (open pollinated) 24-1 was grown from seed in 2024. It has Trailman as a seed parent but pollen parent is unknown, but most likely from a good tasting apple in the orchard.

Ever since it has been growing, the leaves have shown reddish traits. Possibly this could lead to some reddish in the flesh, time will tell.

Earlier this year I grafted it to both G41 rootstock and G890 rootstock. Both were kept in pots throughout the summer with G890 being planted in the seedling trial rows this fall.

Both grafts exhibit Trailman’s normal vigor with G41 graft growing 30” and G890 graft growing 28” this year. A pretty good amount of growth for our short, cloudy, rainy summer! If they match this growth next year they could possibly be close to 6 feet tall by end of summer 2027. I’m also happy to see that the growth is pretty consistent between the two rootstocks.

They are hardening off well for winter and I’m excited to watch what this new variety does. Descriptions of both under the photos.

10/05/2026

These apple seedlings have my attention as they are dropping their leaves and preparing for winter. 5 of these are crosses I made while one is an open pollinated seedling.

Fall is a great time to see which seedlings harden off early and drop their leaves and which ones are stubborn and want ...
10/05/2026

Fall is a great time to see which seedlings harden off early and drop their leaves and which ones are stubborn and want to hang on to them. These are a few that are promising and I’ll keep an eye on. So far they are on the right track and separating themselves from the pack. Five of these are crosses I made while one is an open pollinated seedling. All seed parents were grown in Alaska and I used specific pollen from out of state. Descriptions under photos.

Melba apple. I love the look of this apple, very vibrant colors. It’s a hard one to ripen as it needs a long season and ...
10/04/2026

Melba apple. I love the look of this apple, very vibrant colors. It’s a hard one to ripen as it needs a long season and they didn’t make it this year. Still had a good flavor to the juice but the apple was a bit starchy.

The flesh is white with red streaks, tart/sweet and juicy. Reminds me of State Fair but a little more tart. I had a few people ask me this summer if there was an apple I grow that was similar to Granny Smith. Melba was the apple that comes to mind, just a little more juicy.

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Wasilla, AK
99654

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