What you mean is looking at commercial numbers it appears that Arizona is marginal. I personally think that its a false impression. The problem in Arizona is two fold. #1 the prime agricultural land with good water in this state is rapidly being paved over for growing housing instead. Agriculture is very much on the decline. Land prices are skyrocketing. All the best water is in the Salt River Project system and it can supply only the phoenix area (which like I said is rapidly being urbanized). #2 While stone fruit has been tried here commercially in the past it been a long time since anyone really tried anything. Like 20-30 years. In that time a ton has changed in varieties and particularly in rootstock that likes our soil.
My experince says that we can produce some awfuly good stonefruit here. Peaches especially. Our apricots are wildly popular and our trees issue free and productive. We are working hard on developing rootstock types and varieties of cherries that will work here. I also believe apples and pears will eventually be very productive too. Plums are excellent and care free.
Yes, we are faced with similar production problems and our environment is not perfect, although when produced they are excellent. The PF series, Red Haven, and the Stellar series were developed in MI. So for a long time peaches have been developed to grow here. Anyway yeah I think AZ can make some movement. Here we produce about 40 million pounds a season. CA produces over 850. Our production is down, but other crops are up. With new pests the future is unknown.
I lived in Scottsdale between the age of 5 and ll when my father was a prof at ASU. The only fruit I remember well are dates, figs, cantalopes and water melon. The taste for the last three stuck with me, but I didn’t bond with the land until the day my family moved to some semi-wild hills in S. CA called Topanga Canyon.
It seems like in Arizona you could command a premium price for local, organically grown stone fruit, especially from the newer arrivals (speaking of people, not fruit varieties).
The one thing I positively hated about S. CA was the constant threat of extreme drought. When the hills turn dry and brown and the desert winds kick up paradise is lost for me.
Here in NY it has been a tough winter, but spring will be an explosion of green that won’t fade before turning into a spectacle of fall color.
It is interesting how different people are drawn to different kinds of landscapes. Each one provides a unique set of challenges for fruit growers. Each one has its assets.
Things have changed just slightly since you lived here. My grandfathers homestead in Mesa (20 miles outside Phoenix) was very typical for what could be grown here back in the day. Citrus, citrus, and more citrus with a few figs and a quince thrown in. 60 years ago there was no low chill stonefruit that could be tried. Yes Scottsdale had a little acreage in dates (all gone now, only dates in the state are down in Yuma). Melons used to be grown extensively here but thats almost all gone now too. In my youth we used to drive out to the miles of grape farms and pick, thats all gone too. Even the citrus is nearly all gone. The only thing that we still grow a ton of is alfalfa, cotton and dent corn. Every once in a while you might see milo grown for silage for a dairy (almost all the dairys are gone too) or barley.
Enough of that depressing subject! Yes there is a strong market here for Arizona grown organic fruit. At the moment there is only 1 local producer of peaches other than us (and we are very small) and on all the other stuff we grow (apricots, plum, pear, apple, mango, starfruit, passionfruit, pomegranite, fig, grapes, nectarine when it sets and cherry hopefully soon) we are the only producer. Not that its a big money maker but we sure enjoy doing it.
I am so glad you are part of this forum. I’m enjoying your endeaver vicariously. I hope you are getting at least $4 a pound at farmers markets. That’s the standard price in CA from what I’ve seen.
We have resisted selling by the pound as of yet but will likely have to get with the program soon. RIght now we sell by the piece. Last year we sold peaches @$1 ea but thats likely undervaluing them. The funny thing about peoples perception…they will complain about something that is $2 ea but have no issue paying what is the equivelant of $3 a piece if they are paying by the pound instead. Human psycology is always a interesting deal. Makes sense why grocers all sell by the pound.
I don’t remember ever seeing orchardkeepers selling fruit by the piece at any markets I’ve gone to- and I love going to farmers markets when I’m traveling- it’s almost always by weight or sometimes by the box. Farmstands often sell in bushel increments down to a quarter- but I’m sure you are aware of this.
I say you best get a scale. Gotta run with the way the customers think unless there’s a quick way to change it.
What kind of chill hours do they have now in the valley? I mean, say, Central Phoenix? My recollection is that the 75 mile wide swath of asphalt that is the valley had both raised temperatures and had moderated durnal temperature changes.
Central Phoenix saw around 250-300 chill hours this year. Yes it was a warm winter. Still a whole lot better than some of those poor bastards in southern California that only saw 50!
We are on the very rural outskirts of Phoenix up against the bareness of the Indian Reservation. We saw 670 below 45 this year. On cooler years that can almost double…I can confirm those hours are accurate. We are a reporting station for the Weather Underground. The weather station is in the orchard.
This has been a very interesting topic for me. I have good setting across the board with my nectarines, especially Arctic Star, which oversets, and requires significant thinning. But, have had poor set with my flat nectarine, ‘Sauzee King’. My weather of course, is not nearly as hot and dry as amadio’s weather, but still, I’m on the edge of inland S. California weather and coastal S. California weather. I do have some degree of thrips - haven’t controlled for them, yet, as I don’t seem to have anything more than scarred fruit (no increase in rot, yet). But, curious as to what might cause this difference in setting. Will continue to see what you can find on this, amadio. I think my chill hours below 45 were probably in the mid to high 200’s this year. Still, looks like I’m getting a lot of blossoms this year, so, we’ll see how setting goes.
Reviving this old topic. I have a bunch of second-leaf nectarines and peaches (trees and grafts), most of which bloomed profusely, but peaches almost uniformly set fruit much better than nectarines. There are a few fruits I see on the nectarines but it’s almost nothing compared to the number of flowers. Older peaches set fruit like crazy. Apricots also set very well this year despite rainy and cool weather during the bloom. This spring was very wet here (North Cal), so drying pollen is not a factor. I guess, nectarines just take longer to get into mature production than peaches. Eric (@amadioranch), did the fruit set on your nectarines improve as they matured?
In my greenhouse with little wind and no bees, peaches set better than nectarines. The set on nectarines can be improved by wetting them with water once or twice a day during bloom. I think that must help move the pollen from the anthers to the stigma.
I also have poor set outdoors on both peaches and nectarine. Some was freeze damage but I think some is lack of chilling. They bloomed but didn’t set and no freeze after bloom.
All my trees are in the open, and this year we had a lot of rainy and windy days during bloom, so I don’t think the lack of pollen movement was an issue. Most of the peaches set as if they were channeling their inner blueberry. Nectarines are completely different in this aspect.
Nope. Same old poor set. Wet years, cool years, dry years, high chill years, low chill years. Ive topworked just about all my nectarines over to peaches. With exception of Arctic star, which sets ok, doesnt size worth a darn, but I enjoy snacking on. Of zero commercial use tho.
I never noticed a difference between peaches and nectarines.setting. Both set well. All gardening is local! I get about 80 on each of my two trees. I probably thinned 150 off.
I’m doing a lot of grafting so expect a smaller number of fruits this year, as some fruiting wood is going to be cut off. Actually a lot as I plan to graft like a beast.Takes are low as all know, so I will be doing a lot to at least get one of each cultivar.
Last year my Nectaplum had few flowers, not sure why? But it set almost all of them, so i got about 30 fruit. This year it’s loaded with flower buds like all my other trees usually are. Something killed many of the buds last winter. Not sure what?
My nectarine is on Lovell rootstock that I bough from big box store. It has never had any problems of setting fruits. My peaches ( reliance, July Elberta) were brought from starkbro, don’t know on what root stocks. Both set fruits well too. However, the more I look at my July Elberta ripe date which is consistently the last week of August, the more I suspicious the tree I received isn’t July Elberta that I have ordered.
Yes, my comments are only as pertains to nectarines in the Phoenix valley. I continue to try new types of nectarines but other than arctic start…none set enough to be worth growing. And arctic star doesnt size right for me.
Spice Zee is getting the topwork treatment soon. Huge mature tree, massive bloom, crap set. Yet another dave wilson looser.
I would be curious as to why nectarines don’t set well in the west. And why us in the east never knew it was a problem. I noticed that peach trees are fairly weak trees, and can bend or even break with a heavy load. Arctic Glo does not. The wood appears strong, Funny how different nectarines are from peaches, yet the same species. It is believed the first nectarines were sports. Now we breed new ones.
. Maybe try wetting the flowers a few times. I have heard this is a technique with some plants to transfer pollen on self fertile plants. Rain and humidity seem to help fungal spores, maybe pollen too? OK, I see this sort of thing was suggested already. Oh well, nothing wrong with some good peaches instead!
My grandfathers homestead in Mesa (20 miles outside Phoenix) was very typical for what could be grown here back in the day. Citrus, citrus, and more citrus with a few figs and a quince thrown in. 60 years ago there was no low chill stonefruit that could be tried. Yes Scottsdale had a little acreage in dates (all gone now, only dates in the state are down in Yuma). Melons used to be grown extensively here but thats almost all gone now too. In my youth we used to drive out to the miles of grape farms and pick, thats all gone too. Even the citrus is nearly all gone. The only thing that we still grow a ton of is alfalfa, cotton and dent corn. Every once in a while you might see milo grown for silage for a dairy (almost all the dairys are gone too) or barley.