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Thursday, October 10, 2013

The Honeycrisp Apple





Ah, behold, the coveted Honeycrisp apple.  Sure it will set you back at the grocery story, but it's worth it, right?  Crisp, firm, sweet, and with just the right amount of tart.  Beautifully shaped and perfectly red.  A work of art I say.  

 "U.S. Plant Patent 7197 and Report 225-1992 (AD-MR-5877-B) from the Horticultural Research Center indicate that the Honeycrisp is a hybrid of the apple cultivars Macoun and Honeygold. However, genetic fingerprinting conducted by a group of researchers in 2004, which included those who were later attributed on the patent, determined that neither of these cultivars is a parent of the Honeycrisp, but that the Keepsake (another apple developed by the same University of Minnesota crossbreeding program) is one of the parents." -Wikipedia

The genetic makeup of the Honeycrisp is probably hidden in a vault somewhere.  And while only one of the mother species is known to regular Joes, you probably will never be able to reproduce the tree yourself.  The seeds in the Honeycrisp are rendered useless and will not produce for you a fruit bearing tree true to the original apple you are eating.  It will be a hybrid of whatever pollinates the tree.  Gosh, science!


2 comments:

Thanks for commenting, you rock!