This may finally give me the push I needed to go bud a few more varieties on it. I’ve already got some grafts going, but maybe I should make sure I get rid of all but 1 branch of TangO. To do that, I should get better graft coverage, so that the tree won’t be lopsided…
That’s good to hear- I was planning to place an order there anyways for jujubes (I believe they source from LE Cooke, who grew some nice 3/4-7/8" caliper trees this year) and I’ll add one of these. The June Pride description on the site:
Excellent, early, high quality peach for home orchards; perhaps the best flavored peach for its season. Intensely flavored, highly colored, yellow freestone. Ripens early July. 500 hrs. Self-fruitful. Pat. No. 6747 (Zaiger). Available on Nema.
Fruitnut, the difference is actually significant. The Ca trees get ample spring water to size up the fruit and then the water is turned way down. This has always been my thought, that it is only the period leading up to ripening that influences brix- earlier water encourages more cells- later water, bigger, more watery cells. If you are growing trees outside in a Mediterranean climate this will happen on a “normal” year as the rain often stops by about April, which is mid-spring in much of CA. Maybe you should experiment with more water early to see if you get bigger fruit with similar sugar.
Lots of the fruit of my formative years grew without supplementary water in S. CA. Brix must have been very high. Amazing how my palate has adapted to the more watery east coast fruit I eat now. It is still way better than what they ship from CA.
One observation I made is that my necta plum accepts grafts like a plum. I have red haven and a plum grated on. And I plan on putting June pride on it to. You know the seeds might be good for rootstock.
That damage happened on a really hot day. You can see where the suns rays were strongest and burnt the leaves. You have plans to irrigate more. I think that would be appropriate. You don’t need to go hog wild with more water. That could result in cracked fruit. Maybe double up on what you’ve been doing the rest of the summer.
I don’t think it’s only. And I think it takes more than a month of dry weather just before harvest. But without a controlled experiment we are both just guessing. The important thing to me is that the differences possible are huge in my view. The conditions that lead to a doubling of brix doesn’t happen in the last month. Shoot I’ve got pluots that are already very sweet that I don’t harvest until late Sept. Yes a month of dry weather can help but it won’t do a double or even 10 points, maybe 5. But that’s a WAG.
Devils advocate here: It can’t just be water. It also has to be something to do with the number of moles of photons the plant gets. More sun early in the season might also lead to increased stores of starch that can be converted into sugar when ripening happens.
Yes light plays a role. But if that were the main factor then thinning more could solve that issue. I’m thinking Alan has said that thinning more doesn’t help all that much. I think thinning could add 5 points.
Hot dry weather slows the plants vegetative growth. It causes the plant to increase it’s osmotic potential, ie it sucks the water out of the tree. That alone will raise brix. Add a water deficit and brix really goes up.
Alan has stated his trees are really vigorous. That isn’t a condition that leads to high brix fruit. High vigor only happens when the tree is full of water. A tree full of water leads to fruit full of water. He probably has really good soil with high water holding capacity. That doesn’t help in a humid wet climate.
Yeah, I agree if the ground is saturated. I was thinking of the scenario where the precipitation amount is on the cusp of disaster. Does it give a little extra margin?
My Japanese plum crops (in-ground trees) are very light and they have been cracking. I’ve never seen them crack before.There have been small rain showers more days than not this year, but precipitation totals are not excessive. Usually they have heavy crops or no crops. Seeing the plums split made me worried about the nectarines, but they set heavy and probably are on the under-thinned side. I was wondering if the might be a good thing with the way this year has turned out.
I’m not just guessing. Vigorous spring growth DOES encourage more cells in the fruit which is known to increase brix levels. Fruitgrower doesn’t cut off water until later in the season and gets very high sugar. I would like to know more precisely when cutting off the water actually becomes an advantage- that is where we are currently guessing. Unfortunately, I don’t live in a climate where I can experiment, but you are in a situation where you could do a limited controlled study and find out quickly.
I have always felt light is a much differentRobles in the north than what we deal with in Texas. Here I think we actually benefit from some shade on a lot of things. Didn’t you say even your outdoor trees under the shade covers produce top quality fruit. You and both grow under heavy shaded greenhouses. To me that means light isn’t that big of a deal for us but up north it may more of a factor. Does this sound about right?
Where are you getting this from? I don’t know why more cells would increase brix.
Conditions that lead to smaller cells would favor higher brix. That’s how it was in sugarbeet and how it would be in fruit. Less water will make smaller celled, higher brix fruit.
I believe Fruitgrower is near Oroville. He’s had about three dry months since the rains quit from last winter.[quote=“alan, post:91, topic:11982”]
but you are in a situation where you could do a limited controlled study and find out quickly.
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I really can’t the trees are too close together. My greenhouse isn’t as big as you think and the roots spread out. It can’t be done in pots.
More cells in ratio to size is what I mean- if the fruit gets its size from the quantity of cells as opposed to the size of individual cells it will register higher brix. You can have larger fruit with the same brix by reducing water at the right time. Fruit growers June Pride ripens in late June. If the fruit he showed was from this seasons fruit the soil was probably still quite moist from rain well into May.
We are actually in Orangevale, about 25 miles east of Sacramento, close to Folsom lake. I do a lot of Salmon fishing trips in the Oroville area though, that’s how I found Bocks fruit stand between Gridley and Marysville on Hwy 70, where I learned a few things. We got a ton of rain through about early April and then it got windy and hot drying everything out. I started irrigation in last few days of April, which is pretty normal. The mulch helps keep a lot of available water until then. The JPs were a little late this year, about 4th of July, but great as usual. Those pictures were from this years harvest, taken on July 13th. One very frustrating thing about growing these is the birds and bugs like it best too, it gets highly colored and fragrant!!
Checked my neighbors tree I multi-grafted a Saturn and two plums on yesterday. Brown rot took every single Saturn peach all but two plums. There were a minimum of 50 Saturn before I thinned it to half a month ago.
I read yesterday to clean pruners between cuts and remove any branches having fruit with brown rot. Is that necessary? I am going to remove the fruit from the tree and any on the ground while next year get on a spray schedule I’m hoping with Indar.
I can only say that commercial growers don’t do that and neither do I. I will remove shoots with dead leaves from brown rot, but I’d never sanitize between cuts or remove whole branches- the BR pathogen is everywhere anyway.
The most important thing besides spraying with the right materials is getting sunny weather. It also helps to remove any fruit that shows first signs of rot. Also to summer prune as much as necessary to keep trees open- shoots with peaches can be cut back when they get more than 30 leaves beyond the peaches. All the rain in my area this season has me pruning my trees every time I walk through them. I have never seen such vigorous growth on cropping peach trees as this year. The ground has not dried out for a day and it is almost Aug. I’m glad the monsoon appears to be relenting to more normal precip levels.