Teign Harvey

Small to medium sized fruit are flat, round, and obscurly ribbed. Flesh is hard, not very juicy, tannic, and sharp. Ripens mid-season. DNA tested in 2024 and confirmed correct. An English cider variety that the USDA received in 1949 from the Agricultural and Horticlultural Research Station in Long Ashton, Bristol, United Kingdom (USDA PI 175549). In 2005, Bernwode Fruit Trees nursery in Ludgershall, Buckinghamshire, UK, sought out the variety from the USDA collection. Bernwode's research suggests it's an old Devon cider apple and although "there was no historic record of its existence. Some research revealed that there used to be a Teign-Harvey Farm in Stoke-in-Teign-Head, close to the coast, just south of the Teign estuary. Norman Howard, an 80 year old retired farmer of the area, knew the farm and reported that little of it remains. While he believes there are no cider trees there now, he recalls cider growing in the area between Shaldon and Combe Cellars from his youth. He also recalls visiting a farm in Totnes, where the farmer spoke of Teign Harvey apples." SSE acquired scions from Bernwode Fruit Trees in 2014. SSE Accession # 132376