Our Variety Assessment

Its strengths, growing requirements and the conditions in which it performs best.

Spartan is an excellent garden variety for growers who enjoy sweet and fruity apples. Its crimson fruit has white, crisp and exceptionally juicy flesh with a gently vinous flavour when fully ripened on the tree. Productive and fairly resistant to scab, it is generally easy to grow. The tree can, however, become susceptible to canker in particularly damp regions.

Spartan

Price range: 26,50 € through 59,75 €

Spartan is a McIntosh style apple, easy to grow, crunchy, with a sweet delicate wine-like flavour.

Pre-orders are open

No payment today. You are reserving your trees before the inventory in early August.

After inventory, we will confirm the available trees and send you a payment link.

Dispatch generally takes place from late November to February, depending on the weather and the progress of lifting the trees.

Choose your tree form

1 year old grafted tree – approx. 1–2 m

Half-standard – 1 to 1.5 m stem

Low-stem tree – approx. 60 cm stem

Standard tree – 1.8 m stem and over

Apple rootstock options

Bittenfelder – approx. 6 m mature height

EM9 – approx. 2.5 m mature height

M116 – approx. 4 m mature height

MM111 – approx. 4 m mature height

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Tree size guide

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SKU: 4334 Categories: Apple trees, Eating apple trees

Description

Spartan is a deep marroon-coloured apple with an excellent refreshing sweet flavour, often with a wine-like hint.

That flavour, and the crimson skin, are an easy clue that Spartan is related to the famous Canadian McIntosh apple – but much easier to grow.

Spartan ripens quite late in the season, usually around early October. The apples will remain on the tree over a 2-3 week period, which means you can pick a few at a time rather than have to deal with a glut. This is also the best way to enjoy them because although they keep fairly well, the flavour and crispness fade in storage.

Spartan is also a very good pollinator of other apples, producing large quantities of compatible pollen.

Variety characteristics

Variety origin

Canadian variety bred in 1926 at the Summerland Experimental Station, British Columbia, then introduced in 1936.

Origin

Period of origin

USDA zone

Flowering

Eating / keeping period

Use

Sweetness / acidity

Disease resistance

Self-fertility

Pollinator value

Ploidy

Origin and identity

Parentage

McIntosh × Yellow Newtown Pippin

Growth and adaptation

Vigour and habit

Medium vigour, upright-spreading habit, spur tree, very productive but requires thinning

Disease behaviour

Scab

Resistant

Powdery mildew

Very resistant

Canker

Very susceptible

Pollination

Compatible pollinating varieties

For reliable fruit set, plant at least one variety with a compatible flowering period nearby. Flowering period: 3 - mid season.

Blenheim Orange View this variety

Cox’s Orange Pippin View this variety Bramley’s Seedling View this variety Kidd’s Orange Red View this variety Melrose View this variety

Lesdain Transparent View this variety

Additional variety information for Spartan is provided in partnership with Orange Pippin.