Apple (Malus) Scrumptious® Cordon M9

A modern British-bred dessert apple and RHS Award of Garden Merit holder, 'Scrumptious' has quickly built a reputation as one of the best garden apples around — thin-skinned, child-friendly, and genuinely delicious. Trained as a cordon on the dwarfing M9 rootstock, it's grown as a single stem at a 45-degree angle, making it an excellent way to fit several different apple varieties into a small space — and its naturally neat, upright habit takes especially well to this style of training.

Pale pink blossom appears in April and May, followed by bright red fruit, sometimes dappled with yellow, with crisp, white flesh. The flavour is complex and fragrant — honeyed and sweet with notes of berry and a hint of liquorice. Harvest from early September, one of the earliest apples of the season, though the fruit doesn't store for long, keeping for around one to two weeks.

'Scrumptious' is self-fertile and will crop reliably alone, though it fruits even better with a pollination partner in the same period (Group 2 or 3, depending on source) or an adjacent group. It's a naturally good pollinator itself, disease-resistant, and bred specifically to cope well with UK garden conditions, including some frost resistance at blossom time. Cordons are typically spaced around 75cm–1m apart against a wire support system and need summer pruning to maintain their narrow shape. On M9, trees will need permanent staking or wire support throughout their life, but reward you with an early, compact cropper.

Plant in full sun in moist, well-drained soil. As with all apple varieties, the pips contain small amounts of naturally occurring toxins, so they're best removed if the fruit is being used for cooking with children in mind.

Each tree is hand-selected before dispatch. Available from Pengelly Garden Centre.