Photo: John Carl D'Annibale

An apple tree planted in 1978 shows its root stock, bottom, below the tree's trunk at Indian Ladder Farms Wednesday June 28, 2017 in Altamont, NY. (John Carl D'Annibale / Times Union)

An apple tree planted in 1978 shows its root stock, bottom, below the tree's trunk at Indian Ladder Farms Wednesday June 28, 2017 in Altamont, NY. (John Carl D'Annibale / Times Union)

Young apple trees grown on Geneva root stock at Indian Ladder Farms Wednesday June 28, 2017 in Altamont, NY. (John Carl D'Annibale / Times Union)

Young apple trees grown on Geneva root stock at Indian Ladder Farms Wednesday June 28, 2017 in Altamont, NY. (John Carl D'Annibale / Times Union)

Peter Ten Eyck points out a young apple tree trunk, top, and its Geneva root stock, bottom, at his Indian Ladder Farms Wednesday June 28, 2017 in Altamont, NY. (John Carl D'Annibale / Times Union)

Peter Ten Eyck points out a young apple tree trunk, top, and its Geneva root stock, bottom, at his Indian Ladder Farms Wednesday June 28, 2017 in Altamont, NY. (John Carl D'Annibale / Times Union)

Peter Ten Eyck walks between rows of SnapDragon apple trees grown on Geneva root stock at his Indian Ladder Farms Wednesday June 28, 2017 in Altamont, NY. (John Carl D'Annibale / Times Union)

Peter Ten Eyck walks between rows of SnapDragon apple trees grown on Geneva root stock at his Indian Ladder Farms Wednesday June 28, 2017 in Altamont, NY. (John Carl D'Annibale / Times Union)

How roots and technology are transforming New York orchards

Altamont

It's 4 p.m. and Peter Ten Eyck is sipping a half-cup of coffee and talking about elephant and mouse hair.

I came to his Altamont orchard to inquire about a unique apple rootstock known as Geneva 935, and he's happy to oblige.

But first: Elephant and mouse hair. Consider the difference, he asks, in spacing between the two. How does that affect the animal skin below? What about how it gets sunlight? The height of the hairs? The width?

This, he says, is the modern apple farmer's dilemma: the constant trial, error and frustration in pursuit of that perfect mix of space, width, height, shade and sunshine.

An hour later he describes today's orchards as in the middle of a rapid conversion "between art and science."

"It used to be an art," he says. "But now there's a little bit of both."

He considers himself more of a scientist a fact made increasingly evident by his casual use of phrases like "light inception per acre" and "service area ratios vs. volume." Indeed, if there are three things Peter inherited from his grandfather, it's the middle name "Gansevoort," this plot of land at Indian Ladder Farms and an absolute love for all things apples.

After a few more minutes of technical chatter that's clearly above my head, he decides it's best to just show me what he means. We jump in his red Subaru Outback and take a quick route up an old dirt hill toward the back of the farm.

From afar it looks like any old orchard. That quickly changes.

If the elder Peter Gansevoort were alive today, he'd not likely recognize many parts of the land on which he once toiled. The glacier-sculpted sediment cliffs of the Helderberg Escarpment still tower beautifully over the plot. But 100 years after the orchard's founding, its aesthetics are changing, and fast.

Peter notes that when he points to the oldest trees, many of which are clinging to life in their twilight years. He remembers planting them as a high schooler in the 1950s. They are thick and short, scattered so as not to grow onto one another, with twisting, bulbous bodies and saw scars that show their age. Sixty years after planting they have all the unkempt and picturesque bushiness of an orchard that draws thousands of amateur pickers to frolic between their trees each fall.

"That's what an apple tree looks like if you don't modify it," he says.

The area is patchy and spacious like the hair on an elephant. I get it now.

A natural apple tree palnted in the 1950's at Indian Ladder Farms...

He points out the window to another section of trees. They are carved into the hill with scalpel-like precision. From head-on they are tight and tidy, with an intentional uniformity like that of a polished military battalion. Football fields-worth of drip line undergird their bases, and at their midway points hang hundreds of bamboo splints that keep the new trees growing up, not outward.

They are about 3 feet apart, tangling atop each other mouse hair; Geneva trees.

Named for the location of the Cornell University lab in which they were perfected or rather, made as close to perfect as possible the Geneva rootstocks are the brainchild of years of scientific tinkering. It's been decades since they were first inoculated with disease and fungi, and the final product is a root that is more resistant to deadly pathogens like fire blight, and can be customized for new apple varieties.

They allow apple growers to fuse together different tree tops with rootstocks that can stave off disease and are far less reliant on pesticides.

"If you look at an apple tree today, you're really looking at two apple trees," Peter says.

Young apple trees grown on Geneva root stock at Indian Ladder Farms...

Years ago, tree nurseries would simply grow seedlings from random apple seeds, and use those as rootstock. It was an arduous process that, because of the variants in genetic makeup, required each tree to be treated with individualized care that drained precious hours and energy. Nor were those rootstocks made for specific soils and climates.

"It was like going to a grocery store you'd just pick whatever was available," said Gennaro Fazio, an apple breeder and geneticist at Cornell's plant science school in Geneva.

But that all started changing in the 1970s. The Malling rootstocks, named for the research center from which they originated in East Malling, England, quickly became the dominant stock for the global apple industry. But they too were vulnerable.

Enter Cornell breeders James Cummins and Herbery Aldwinckle: The two started tinkering in their Geneva lab around the same time the Malling rootstocks were being popularized. Years later they had created a modern rootstock that is the basis for today's Geneva rootstock.

"Some of these apple varieties require a little bit more vigor in their roots," says Fazio, who picked up the two's torch after their retirements. "Some require a little bit of a different nutritional balance. So what we're trying to do is match the root systems with new varieties ... That allows the grower to come up with the best possible scenario" for their orchard.

These new trees are "like insurance," he said. "I've seen entire orchards wiped out" by fire blight and other diseases. "But this tree will survive an infection. ... You don't lose an orchard. You don't lose a tree."

The Geneva rootstocks can be tailored to fit with other trees, and so are more customizable. In an apple industry that's increasingly about niche products, that matters.

"The biggest investments are in new varieties and higher-producing, more efficient systems," says Jeff Crist, owner of Crist Brothers Orchards, in Orange County. "Those are the only ways we stay relevant, and the root system is really the base of that process."

Peter, for example, has a few acres of Snapdragon apples, a new variety created by Cornell breeder Susan Brown. They're sweet and juicy, with a vibrant bright red skin and a notable crunch, and since being introduced in 2013, they've been in high demand a trend on which Peter is hoping to capitalize this fall.

"We're going to find out how many the public wants," he says. "And then we're going to grow exactly one less than (that) so we can set a good price."

There are, of course, some downsides to the new tech. The Geneva roots are more expensive, and Peter says some of the thousands of Indian Ladder's annual visitors who have been going there for years have remarked on the changing scenery.

But the efficiency and cost savings are worth it, especially for larger orchards less reliant on picking season.

Crist says, "If it keeps the trees alive, well, that's a lot better of a look than it they're dead, right?"

RDownen@timesunion.com 518-454-5018 @RobertDownenTU

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How roots and technology are transforming New York orchards - Albany Times Union