Adam's Apples

I jumped into this blog at the start of the harvest in 2008 , eager to see what farmers market had in store. There have been pleasant surprises every year, and I have always tried to fulfill my promise to share wonder without adding too many frills.

In this photograph, Lodi (left) and GoldRush clasp hands across the seven barren months that divide one harvest from another. Lodi , the tapered green fruit at left, is the harbinger of the new harvest, the first and only apple at farmers market. GoldRush was picked last October and has spent its days in my mudroom and refrigerator. Let's see how they compare.

The cupboard is bare at Nagog Hill Farm yesterday.

There's Lee Calhoun , who chased the old apples and their stories across the south. He rescued 400 varieties from near extinction though the primal wizardry of jamming a stick from the old tree into the rooted trunk or branch of a younger one and making them live on as one. Magic. Tom Burford plowed similar turf, while John Bunker did (and does) much the same in Maine. No American state has a finer apple heritage.