The apple detectives hunting for lost varieties

The apple detectives hunting for lost varieties Getty Images The UK is home to many varieties of apples. Scientists called this "ghost apple", a parent of varieties like Royal Jubilee and Hormead's Pearmain, Unknown Founder 8. It's his pomological White Whale, the apple that haunts his thoughts Though these trees have had a basic genetic identification, Teiser hopes to have a more in-depth sequence run at some point, one that could give more details about how these trees fit into the family tree. There's the Forest Styre, a cider apple that was once incredibly common, 400 years ago, in the Forest of Dean: the last known confirmed example was destroyed in the mid 20th Century. Back in the Museum of Cider in Hereford, Teiser examines apple portraits made by a watercolorist long ago to accompany Robert Hogg's descriptions of fruit.