Notebook: seven apples worth finding

September is the month for looking up into old trees. These are seven varieties I've come to love, all of them grown in small orchards within a day's drive of the grain shed, none of them easy to find in a shop. If you know where another grows, tell me in the comments.

1. Wyecross Russet. Rough, golden skin and a nutty, almost pear-like flesh. Best eaten in November, after a month in a cool shed.
2. Miller's Seedling. Pale, very early, very sweet. Doesn't keep, so eat it under the tree.
3. Lady Henshaw. Small, red-flushed and sharp. A wonderful juicing apple.
4. Black Ashdown. Dark purple, almost black. The flesh is white and crisp and faintly spiced.
5. Cotter's Pride. A big, lumpy cooking apple that falls into a fluffy purée.
6. Brenna's Green. Keeps until March, wrapped in newspaper, and gets better every week.
7. Long Field Pippin. Not a real variety, yet. A seedling in the hedge behind the shed. We'll see.

A note on finding them: most old varieties survive in a single tree or two, often in a churchyard, an old vicarage garden, or the corner of a field nobody has bothered to clear. Ask in the village shop. Somebody always knows.