Nothing wrong with Redhaven, but here Johnboy tends to be a bit sweeter and deeper orange (better, usually, than my Coralstar)- it is a few days later than Redhaven, but doesn’t overlap with Contender. However, the flower buds are supposed to be tender to late frost. Nothing wrong with Redhaven. You can always do some grafting later.
I will be planting a Desiree tomorrow which is a really early peach… Hope late frost doesn’t make it a non producer… will find out in a couple of years. Also, planting Loring and Victoria Peaches… This way I hit early, middle and end of the year peaches… We shall see.
Great list. I grafted many of those this year.
From what I grafted and thanks to Olpea for his help. These are in ripening order. I’m in zone 5b IL.
Surecrop
Risingstar
Clayton
Redhaven
Allstar
Glohaven
Contender
Scarletprince
Baby Crawford (not sure if he recommended it. I just wanted it).
Madison
PF25
Redskin
Encore
And his notes written for me. There are varieties listed below that I do not have scionwood for.
Considering you are farther north than I, my recommendations might be a bit different for your area, vs. what I might consider “must haves” for someone farther south.
If I lived in central IL, I’d probably plant peaches fairly hardy. The following peaches I consider hardy, produce the best in frosty springs, and taste good. From earliest to latest. Some of these are patented.
Earlystar- There are hardier early peaches (like Harrow Diamond) but I’ve found Earlystar somewhat hardy in my area and tastes considerably better than Harrow Diamond. Earlystar also performs fairly well in challenging spring weather
Surecrop- Good hardiness and excellent performance in poor spring weather.
Risingstar-Ripens a few days after Surecrop and tastes better. While Risingstar has performed well for me in frosty springs, it’s not performed as well as Surecrop after a cold winter.
Saturn-If you like white peaches, this is a sweet white donut I’ve found a hardy and regular producer
Clayton- I don’t have much experience with this peach, so any concrete recommendation would be pre-mature, but so far this one looks promising.
Redhaven- Hardy and reliable. This would qualify as a “must have” in my opinon.
Challenger-Not a lot of experience on this one either, but so far looks very good and it reported to be very hardy.
Allstar- Hardy here and very productive every year.
Glohaven- Ripens with Allstar, but not as hardy. Tastes better than Allstar.
Intrepid- I have very little experience with this one. I have about 5 trees of this one, but they are still young. I mention it because it may be a very hardy and productive selection. It was developed in the same breeding program as Challenger and Contender, and supposed to be as hardy. This may be a variety you would want to take a look at.
Contender-A must have for anyone in a colder environment.
Veteran-Ripens with Contender. Very winter hardy but not as big or red as Contender
Scarletprince-Not a lot of experience, but may be winter hardy and seems productive in frosty springs. High quality very tasty fruit.
Julyprince-A little more experience and ditto all the comments about Scarletprince.
Baby Crawford- Hardy and very productive here.
Madison-A lot like Veteran, but ripens a week later
PF25-Hardy and productive, larger than Madison.
Redskin-Lots of experience with this one. Hardy and very productive. Doesn’t color very well.
Encore-Hardy and fairly productive, but have had trouble getting this one to reach acceptable levels of sugar.
PF35-007-Hardy and very productive. Good flavor. A very quality late season peach.
These are all off-patent.
Dax
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I have leftover scionwood of all I believe. I cut the sticks mostly into 4-5" pieces. Anyone want any they are welcome to them. You just pay shipping. PM me with your address and caliper I suppose. I’ll give to you my paypal info.
Should be $2.66 to ship 1st class.
Dax
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For me, I wanted to fill the late spots first as early peaches are not very good. Some are OK, but nothing is really early and excellent. Some decent ones though, your best tasting peaches are going to be the later ripening ones.
Last year in NE Ohio I harvested two Avalon Pride peaches that were ripe approximately 10 days before Redhaven, which I guess is moderately early. They were juicy, well-flavored and a little on the soft side.
How did you cure the borer problem in your peach trees?
I dug out any borers I found and around mating season I painted the bottom 4" or so of the trunks with 100% raw neem oil. I am now using a combo of raw neem/linseed/sesame oils since its a bit cheaper that way. This appears to be a very effective deterrent to egg laying. Note I also trap the males using pheromone traps.
See
for where it was discussed before.
BTW this spring so far I have only found borers in small peach seedlings I did not paint. I dug up all the seedlings partly to guarantee no borers would escape me.
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TY for the information. I thought perhaps you had dug them out or used a piece of metal to push into the bore hole. I’ll have to look for the pheromone traps to hang as well. Are you using the little open house looking ones or the apple maggot ball traps?
I’ll paint the trunks of mine as well. Sounds like a good plan to prevent them with a coating of the oils. My peach trees are into their 4th greening so I would hate to lose them at this early point.
I don’t think the apple balls work for borers, get the open house ones. Which reminds me, I need to order fresh traps for the coming year 
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Dax, What is your percentage of takes when grafting peaches?
Do you wait untl petal fall to graft? Are you grafting onto mature trees or rootstock?
When do you put your traps out?
Borer flight depends on location … oddly enough the further south the later it is … its based on how many days til fall cold, that amount is fixed for all climates so warmer climates they fly later. For me in Maryland its early May I put them out.
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I don’t know yet. But I saw another thread about cherries being difficult last week and of 25 in my greenhouse grafted on 3-13 all 25 are pushing. Until now I’ve stuck mostly plums onto a Prunus americana colony at my friend’s lake.
I truly believe if the root is good and the scion is healthy and the buds have swollen up there’s no reason not to graft. I won’t graft if the buds are swollen and the temperature forecast if for lows in the 30’s and highs in the 40’s for a week. I’ll wait until highs are in the mid-fifties or more and lows are in the 40’s.
And I haven’t grafted enough persimmons to know yet either but I do know that when I did graft them when it was hot outside and a far month past bud swell, maybe 6-weeks, that success was near 100%.
If no one had told me something was difficult I’d never have given it a second thought. I have always grafted anything and everything at the same bud plumping/scales splitting on the buds times… except for bark grafts or banana grafts you have to wait longer so that the bark is fully slipping.
Dax
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I agree with you 100%. You’re lucky as I heard the general advice and it didn’t work at all for me. A local told me to graft when the trees flower and I had good success (like near 100%) after 2 years of zero takes. I wish i would have just did it and worry about advice later. The conditions here at flowering are pretty much as you describe, it’s not cold, but certainly not warm either.
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Dax,
Just wanted to follow up. Of all those varieties I sent you, only Clayton and Glohaven failed to sail through our winter this year (two separate occasions of -9F). Clayton and Glohaven still have enough live blooms for a full crop, just not loaded like the other varieties. Victoria (for a late peach - patented) also sailed through the winter and loaded with blooms. Julyprince, which I may have sent you wood, was loaded as usual.
-9F isn’t super cold, but it was cold enough to remove a lot of fruit buds from some varieties. Varieties which had significant fruit bud damage from this winter:
Spring Prince - Almost blank
Spring Snow - this is disappointing because it’s my best tasting early peach
Sentry - always a light cropper and this year fruit buds hit hard. Plan to remove.
Glenglo - my favorite early peach for overall size and quality, but it had some significant winter damage to fruit buds.
June Prince - Almost blank
Blaze Prince
Winblo - Not terrible bud kill, but significant
Glowingstar
Lady Nancy
PF 28-007
O’Henry - have about a dozen trees and almost all blank
None of these varieties would require thinning this year, even before the spring frosts we are scheduled to get this Sat./Sun.
Most of the tender varieties above are no surprise. Pretty much every year they have problems keeping up (production wise) with the hardy list above. It doesn’t mean I plan on getting rid of all the tender ones. For example, I planted more Spring Snow last fall. It’s such an excellent early peach. Glenglo is tender, but again the quality is so good I plan to keep it. Winblo is a good peach I plan to keep.
O’henry is a problem and I’d love to find something other than Encore to replace it. I have plenty of Encore, and with its sometimes flavor issues, I rather not add anymore of them.
The last two trees of Lady Nancy are on their way out.
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Yep, same time frame.
Dax
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Thanks, Mark.
Dax
Always good info from you, thanks for sharing it. My observations is that these trees may take more cold if conditioned better. Seems your temp swings are large. Really I think the trees you listed are not good at hardening off. I think they may fair better if the climate was more buffered from quick change. Steve even has it worse. Maybe I’m wrong, it’s just that I’m a 1/2 zone colder and bud tenderness is rarely an issue. About once a decade.I’ll know more once some of my tender varieties mature. Well a little, i don’t plan on adding any of those except June Prince. Once Alan and i looked at historic temps in Michigan and NY, and it told the same tale. that was fun to look at.
I don’t like to grow the norm at times and like to explore and push the envelope. although now my little backyard orchard is full. Most of my time is playing around with breeding, mostly berries, but I would like to experiment with pluots too. I have so many unusual stone fruits, it’s going to be fun. Last year the pluots were so outstanding, I can’t wait for the next crop! I want to look at species stone fruit too, IE wild types.
That’s true. I think it was Jerry Frecon who said the same thing. Some varieties which are very hardy in places where the temps are cold but stable, are not hardy in places where there are significant temp swings.
Alan has mentioned that Reliance peach really isn’t much help in his area, that when it’s cold enough to wipe all the dormant peach buds out, it’s cold enough to wipe out Reliance too, indicating that peaches in the past have taken some pretty cold temps and still productive in his area.
Weather Underground is forecasting the next three days of 70+, then down to 25F on Sunday. We get some pretty big swings here.