A historic apple orchard in western Fremont County is home to a variety once thought to be extinct.
At the Amy Homestead near Howard, dozens of century-old apple trees continue to produce fruit. Among them is a Walbridge, a late-blooming apple that was once popular in the United States before falling out of cultivation.
The variety was long considered lost, but Cinde McPhail, who owns the Amy Homestead, observed that the tree’s characteristics matched historical descriptions of the Walbridge. The tree was confirmed as a Walbridge earlier this year by MyFruitTree of Washington State University, part of the Horticulture Department. This could be evidence that other varieties once considered lost may still be waiting to be found.
And McPhail thinks there may be more Walbridge trees in the area.
“I still suspect there are way more of them; we just don’t know about them,” McPhail said. “They’re in somebody’s yard or in a park.”
The Amy Homestead orchard dates back to 1882, when Sanford Amy settled on the property. A Civil War veteran, Amy had previously lived in nearby Howard, but left as the arrival of the railroad made the community busier. He preferred the quieter, more remote homestead.
Of the original apple trees, about 73 remain. The orchard now has roughly 140 trees, including grafted varieties propagated from historic trees.
The trees represent a wide range of apples, including Winesap, Ben Davis, Whitney Crab and Maiden’s Blush, along with several unidentified varieties.
One unidentified apple, locally called the Colorado Lemon, produces small, highly distinctive fruit with a lemon-like flavor.
McPhail recently had the apple trees DNA tested and found two more unexpected heritage varieties—Missouri Pippin and Sweet Bough.
The orchard’s diversity is part of what makes the old trees valuable, according to orchardist and apple enthusiast Caleb Richter. Different varieties bloom and produce fruit at different times, and their genetics could be useful for future breeding programs, particularly as growers contend with Colorado’s challenging mountain climate.
“Apples that have to grow in mountain climates have to fight for their existence. There’s intense UV radiation and temperature swings, and so the fruit generally has more compounds in it to defend that fruit from those adverse conditions,” Richter explained. “Color, taste, all those chemical compounds: it makes a better apple.”
McPhail belongs to the Arkansas Valley Fruit Tree Network, a group modeled after the Montezuma Orchard Restoration Project (MORP), that shares ideas and connects people interested in growing fruit in the Arkansas River Valley.
“It’s always interesting to have that mystery,” Richter explained. “Why did they plant it? Where did it come from?”
The orchard is also a reminder of Colorado’s history as an important fruit-growing region.
Fremont County’s mild climate—sometimes referred to as the area’s “banana belt”—helped make the Arkansas Valley particularly well suited to growing fruit. Orchards supplied fruit to nearby mining communities and, at times, markets farther away. Colorado-grown fruit also received recognition at world’s fairs in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Much of that history has since disappeared, but remnants remain in old orchards, irrigation systems, and isolated trees scattered throughout the region.
Preserving those trees is now becoming a priority for local fruit growers and enthusiasts. Advocates are working to keep these old varieties from disappearing and potentially giving apples that have survived for more than a century another hundred years.
Grafting classes teach people how to propagate historic varieties by taking cuttings from existing trees and establishing them on new rootstock. The goal is to keep rare varieties alive, and put them into the hands of a new generation of growers.
At the Amy Homestead, that means a tree planted more than 140 years ago could help produce new trees for another century.
Copyright KLZR 2026
This story was shared via Rocky Mountain Community Radio, a network of public media stations in Colorado, Wyoming, Utah, and New Mexico, including Aspen Public Radio.