Kazakhstan — Home Of The Apple

From One, Many

True of almost all plants, the apple we know and love, the Fuji or McIntosh that resides next to the banana in the fruit bowl, came from a single tree. Malus sieversii is a wild apple native to the mountains of Central Asia in southern Kazakhstan.

A Single Tree

That sounds simple enough and even logical. Apple trees that cover the planet sprung from just one plant. A lot had to happen for the tree to spread from place to place, yielding the sweet, fleshy fruit we love.

Kazakhstan- Home of The Apple

Thanks to the work of Russian scientist Nikolai Vavilov, who first identified Malus Sieversii in 1929 as the progenitor of our first apple in the mountains of Kazakhstan. That was 10,000 years ago.

Today we have apple orchards everywhere. So how did seeds from a single tree 10,000 years ago spread around the planet? The apples drop to the ground once the tree bears the fruit. That becomes food for grazing animals. As they walk away from the tree, the undigested seeds come out of their body. Some of these take root. Over an extended period, the seeds spread out, and after being repeated over the years, you start to have apple trees. That’s pretty obvious.

Take An Apple With You

Once humans come across these trees and find apples, an apple is portable, and they carry the fruit far and wide. Either they drop the seeds or plant them. Rinse repeat.

From a single apple tree, the seeds spread out, and before you know it, the seeds are on boats, ships, birds, and in the hands of humans. Vavilov worked backward.

While all this is happening to give us bushels and bags of apples in the 21st century, this same process was repeated for other trees, grasses, and grains. They became crops.

Crop sizes today stagger the mind, I implore you, drive across Nebraska. An ocean of soybeans awaits. Electric farm machinery would NEVER be able to harvest all the crops we need to feed our population.

Go To Nebraska

So make sure you are in a gasoline-powered vehicle as you cruise the highways. If you have done this before, you know what I am talking about. If you haven’t, you should make the trip.

Think of all the environmental factors at play. We need light, the right temperature, humidity, wind, and water. The trees need to be pollinated — just one reason we need bees.

We have to prune these trees, irrigate them, feed them with nutritious fertilizers. Not to mention, develop the soil the trees like best.

Then it is on to harvesting, distribution, and stocking in markets worldwide. It’s a big job.

How Many Apples Are We Talking About?

I have not found an answer to this one yet. There are millions of trees and at least 10,000 species of apple trees. The math is daunting. Say 500 apples per tree? We’ll need to use your supercomputer to crunch all those apples.

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Douglas Pilarski is an award-winning writer & journalist based on the west coast. He writes about luxury goods, exotic cars, horology, tech, food, lifestyle, and workplace issues!

You’re welcome to share your thoughts or tell me your story. Email me here. [email protected]

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