diff --git a/activerecord/lib/active_record/connection_adapters/sqlite3_adapter.rb b/activerecord/lib/active_record/connection_adapters/sqlite3_adapter.rb
index 386b3f7465..11bb457d03 100644
--- a/activerecord/lib/active_record/connection_adapters/sqlite3_adapter.rb
+++ b/activerecord/lib/active_record/connection_adapters/sqlite3_adapter.rb
@@ -47,11 +47,7 @@ def quote(value, column = nil)
 
       # Returns the current database encoding format as a string, eg: 'UTF-8'
       def encoding
-        if @connection.respond_to?(:encoding)
-          @connection.encoding.to_s
-        else
-          @connection.execute('PRAGMA encoding')[0]['encoding']
-        end
+        @connection.encoding.to_s
       end
 
     end