Pick a bushel of antique apples: Sleeping Bear trees have varieties ‘lost to time’

LEELANAU COUNTY, MI — Take a bite out of history while visiting Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore this fall.

Orchards within the Port Oneida Historic District in the national park are blossoming with heirloom apples from trees dating back to pre-World War II farming communities.

Some of these apple varieties have been ‘lost to time,’ Sleeping Bear wrote on their Facebook page.

You can pick up to one bushel by hand if you’re visiting the Port Oneida orchards, which sits about three miles past Glen Arbor.

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More than 20 years ago, an initiative began to map and identify heirloom apple varieties in the 13 orchards in the Port Oneida district.

To date, 75 varieties have been identified, according to National Park Service.

The area began to develop in the early 1860s when European immigrants moved to the area, where the active port on Lake Michigan offered economic potential, according to NPS.

The logging industry cleared much of the trees and the area turned into a farming community from 1900 to 1945. Many farms date back even further to the 1870s and still have remnants intact like small sheds and chicken coops.

The NPS’ documentation process has found genetic material in the orchards that represent historic varieties that have been lost in the commercial fruit market and are increasingly rare worldwide.

You can learn more about the efforts by the NPS, Leelanau Conservation District, the Michigan State University Northwest Michigan Horticultural Station, and the County Extension Master Gardener Program at nps.gov/slbe.