For hundreds of years, apples have been supplying a delicious and nutritious fruit allover the world. Johnny Chapman, also known as Johnny Appleseed brought from Europe a small variety of apples. Farmers allover the United States took these varieties and combined two or more apples and named them what they thought appropriate.
Years ago Europe had as many as 350 different varieties. Today there are as many as 7000 different varieties throughout the United States. Approximately 20 varieties of apples are used for marketing purposes.
Washington apples are the most beautiful apples grown. The apples grown in the eastern states are the most flavorful. The reason being, the apples grown in the western states have lava rock in the soil from volcanoes over the many thousands of years;
causing the soil not to have the richness that it needs. Therefore they do not produce a very tasteful fruit.
The state of Washington leads in producing apples. They produce as much as four times as any other state. New York has always lead #2 and Michigan #3. Weather this year and the past two years has been exceptional for Michigan farmers. In fact, Michigan this year grew more apples than New York. We, at the Franklin Cider Mill are proud of the apples grown in the state of Michigan; therefore we only use Michigan apples. .
Franklin Cider Mill like other Cider Mills and orchards has a reputation of having a lot of bees buzzing around, especially when families are trying to have a nice relaxing picnic. These bees are important to our reproduction of all fruits and vegetables.
In the spring these busy bees pollinate the blossoms that into nutritious and delicious fruit. The more blossoms, the fruit. Apple trees are not producing as plentiful as years fore; causing the cost to increase apple products