Reflection shows DeclaredFields but returns no fields for simple C# class

I have a very simple class defined like:

public class Apple
{
   public string MyString1;
   public string MyString2;
   public string MyString3;
}

When I try to retrieve the fields or properties of this type, or an instance of it, Reflection returns nothing. However, in Visual Studio, I can see the fields available in "DeclaredFields" member of the type.

Any idea what is going on here? The only thing I can think is maybe the namespaces are causing an issue. Both the location where I am trying to retrieve the property info and the location where the type is defined are in the same top-level namespace, but the former is using the namespace of the latter.

Here is the reflection code:

public static class ReflectionHelper {

public
static
List<string>
GetPropertyNames(Type T)
{
    try
    {
        var properties = T.GetProperties(BindingFlags.Public | BindingFlags.Instance);
        if (properties != null)
        {
            return properties.ToList().Select(property => property.Name).ToList();
        }
        var fields = T.GetFields(BindingFlags.Public | BindingFlags.Instance);
        if (fields != null)
        {
            return fields.ToList().Select(field => field.Name).ToList();
        }
    }
    catch (Exception) { }
    return null;
}
}

I am calling it like:

var apple = new Apple();
var stuff = ReflectionHelper.GetPropertyNames(typeof(Apple));