A very beautiful heirloom apple that stores well.
Williams' Pride Apple on MM.111 (Spring 2025)
An early-season dessert apple that is both cold hardy and disease resistant. Also known as Co-op 23.
This tree is perfect for the backyard or any type of organic production: It is vigorous, spreading, and sturdy, with good branch angles. Cold hardy to zone 4, Williams' Pride is also resistant to fireblight, powdery mildew, and cedar-apple rust, and field immune to scab. This is a delicious and easy-to-grow early-season apple, and it also has an extended bloom (early through to late-mid), making it a great pollenizer. The long bloom time may also help provide crop in spite of frosts. Basically, if you are looking to extend your apple season, you won't find a more reliable tree than Williams' Pride.
The attractive, midsized apple ripens to a dark red-purple that is starred with small white lenticels. The flesh is creamy, crisp, and firm, with a rich and pear-like flavor. In our U-pick orchard we have just a handful of Williams' Pride trees, and they get stripped bare as soon as they ripen by pickers who just can't wait a minute longer for apple season to begin. Ideally, however, the fruit is harvested with several pickings, as it ripens unevenly. If there any left, the apples will store well for about six weeks.
Williams' Pride was bred by the Purdue, Rutgers, and Illinois Universities research team that specializes in disease-resistant cultivars. It is named after Edwin Williams, who led the team for many years, and who selected the variety in 1979. It was released in 1988.
The Fruit
Fruit Type
Category: Apple
Subcategory:
Disease-Resistant, Cold-Hardy
Fruit Uses & Storage
Uses: fresh eating, baking
Storage duration: one to three months (approximate, depending on storage conditions)
Fruit Appearance
Skin color: red
Flesh color: cream
Fruit Origins
Parentage: PRI 1018-101 x NJ 50
Origin: Indiana
Introduced in: 1988
Introduced by: Edwin Williams; Purdue, Rutgers, and Illinois Universities
The Environment
Calendar & Geography
USDA zones: 4 - 8
Chill hours: 400
Ripening date: Aug 18 (approximate, in New York State) 28 days before McIntosh
Tree Height & Spacing
glossary
Rootstock: MM.111 Rootstock
Rootstock size class: Semi-Standard (85% of Standard)
Tree spacing (natural spread of tree): 24'
Good for wildlife planting? N
Diseases & Pests
glossary
Fireblight: Resistant
Powdery Mildew: Resistant
Apple Scab: Immune
Cedar-Apple Rust: Resistant
Pollination
Pollination Factors
glossary
Bloom group: 2
Is it self-fertile? N
Is it fertile? Y
Ploidy: Diploid
Rootstock size class:
Semi-Standard (85% of Standard)
Pollination Partners
This table shows the first few results from a full search for pollenizers of Williams' Pride Apple on MM.111. Please see our Pollenizer Search to run other queries and read how the application uses various factors. Also read more about fruit tree pollination.
See all pollination matches for Williams' Pride Apple on MM.111
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