Impact of apple rootstock/cultivar on processing market profitability

Four apple cultivars suitable for processing ('York Imperial', 'Rome Beauty', 'Stayman', and 'Smoothee Golden Delicious') and four rootstocks (M.26 EMLA, M.9 EMLA, O.3 and B.9) used in a ten-year experiment at Rock Springs, PA were evaluated for relative profitability. Based on cash flow measures, 'Rome Beauty' out performed the other three cultivars by a wide margin because of early yields of large sized fruit. M.26 EMLA was found to be the best rootstock for 'Rome Beauty' because of its high expected cash flow and low variability of income. O.3 was found to be the best rootstock for 'York Imperial', 'Stayman', and 'Smoothee Golden Delicious' based on the same measures. B.9 was found to have the lowest average cash flow and highest-income variability for all four cultivars at the experiment's density of 961 trees/ha. However, at higher densities which would be possible given tree cross sectional area measurement, B.9 was found to be the best rootstock in terms of cash flow for 'York Imperial', 'Rome Beauty', and 'Smoothee Golden Delicious', while O.3 remained the best rootstock for 'Stayman'. To overcome the cash flow differential between 'Rome Beauty' and the other cultivars, prices would need to be 23-94% higher depending on the rootstock used.