Eatable Exhibits: museum in Almaty offers visitors apples

Exhibits that people can taste. Visitors of the Almaty Apple Museum, can now get acquainted with the history of the origin of the fruit, as well as enjoy edible exhibits. The museum fund regularly receives crop from the pomological garden of the Kazakh Research Institute of Fruit and Vegetable Growing. Breeders are constantly working on the creation of new varieties of apples. They are bred on a hybrid basis.

“I would like tell what characteristics are taken into account during the analysis of hybrid offspring. The first is winter hardiness, then - early maturity, the form of the hybrid, the color of the hybrid, the keeping quality of the fruit and, of course, the taste,” said Akmaral Assylbekova, manager, Apple Museum in Almaty.

Scientists of the Research Institute have already bred more than 100 varieties of apples, preserving their genetic fund. Many have successfully passed the tests and are now grown on the farm. Four types of hybrid fruits were the first to ripen in the pomological garden this year.

“These are varieties of sweet and sour taste. Basically, you know, if acid prevails in European varieties and people like such fruits, but in our country people, even children like sweeter varieties. They last longer,” said Svetlana Alekseyenko, Researcher, Kazakh Fruit and Vegetable Research Institute.

Also, scientists note that these varieties have more yield than the Aport apples and give twice as much fruit. In addition, they are resistant to disease and can be stored longer than usual.