The World Foliage Plant Industry - Acta Horticulturae

THE WORLD OF HORTICULTURE
Tree Fruit Growing in Kazakhstan
Raul K. Karychev, Yvgenny Salnikov, Marat T. Nurtazin and Diane Doud Miller
The historical roots of tree fruit growing in
Kazakhstan are connected with the wild apple
and apricot forests on the slopes of the Tien
Shan (Zailiskii Alatau, Dzhungarskii Alatau and
Tarbagati) mountain ranges in south and
southeast Kazakhstan, centered around
Almaty. These wild fruit forests contain Malus
sieversii, the progenitor of the cultivated apple
(Malus xdomestica), an occasional Malus niedzwetzkiana
(red-fleshed species), and Armeniaca
vulgaris, the species from which most apricot
cultivars are directly derived.
It is hypothesized that seeds of these wild species
were moved along the Silk Road by travelers
from antiquity (Forsline et al., 2003) and
from this germplasm apple cultivars were selec-
Apples of Kazakhstan: (A) ‘Almaty Aport’
cultivar; (B) ‘Golden Delicious’ x Malus
niedzwetzkiana seedling; (C) selections
from apple breeding program; (D) fruit
market in Almaty.
Map of Central Asia.
ted, which were adapted to environments
encountered throughout the world. The native
range of apricot is wider and germplasm from
many areas has been included in cultivar development.
The rich diversity of fruit germplasm in Central
Asia (motherland of apple, pear, apricot, plum,
grape, walnut, and myrobalan plum) was
described by Vavilov (1930) in an International
Horticulture Congress held in London. He
described Alma-ata (now Almaty), Kazakhstan,
as the “center of origin” of cultivated apple,
finding in the wild here apples of commercial
quality. A.D. Dzhangaliev established main
areas of wild apple and apricot in this region at
1200-1500 ha and dedicated his career to conservation
of these valuable genetic resources
(Dzhangaliev, 2003; Dzhangaliev et al., 2003).
During the Soviet era, the region around
Almaty was an important center of apple production,
especially for ‘Alexander Aport’, a
Russian cultivar. Malus sieversii seedlings were
commonly used as rootstocks for the Russian
cultivars. ‘Almaty Aport’, a large-fruited cultivar
with high demand in Russia, was trucked to
Moscow. Large state-run orchards were located
around Almaty. Cultivars grown were domesti-
CHRONICA HORTICULTURAE •VOL 45 • NUMBER 4 • 2005 • 21