Fuji is my favorite apple and they are going this way. Can someone explain why? Especially since (I assume) they’re the same trees (Google says Apple trees produce for 50+ years).
I’m not educated on this in any way, but I’d assume it’s something to do with either soil nutrient depletion or pesticides. Or maybe crop inbreeding. (Is that even a thing?)
On the one hand, I’d not put it past corporations to simply replant the same crop over and over until the soil is ruined. On the other, I’d also not put it past corporations to switch to a cheaper pesticide that ended up damaging the product in the end.
Apples are propagated by grafting because the fruit are not true to seed. If you plant a seed, you have no idea what the fruit will be like. So they take known good trees and graft a part of them onto existing root stock of a compatible tree.