I thought I’d start peach evaluation report for 2020. I haven’t really seen a comprehensive one yet for 2020, but maybe I’ve missed it?
A lot of folks in the Midwest lost most of their peach crop (myself included) because of late freezes, so there may not be a lot of evaluations from the central states.
I had some preliminary observations back in April of this year in this thread:
But thought I would post some end of the year evaluations. Sometimes it’s hard to count the number of peaches on a tree after a freeze. The little ones hide in the foliage. It’s much easier to see how the variety performed when it’s close to harvest. As always, I’m only evaluating varieties we’re currently growing. We’ve removed lots of varieties which didn’t make the cut (poor production, poor flavor, etc.) There’s not quite so much for me to sort out (from a variety selection standpoint) since I think I have a fairly good handle on what varieties work best for my orchard, after lots of trials.
Most of the comments this year are focused on whether the variety produced anything or not. In most cases, we want to plant more trees of varieties which produced well this year. Almost nothing needed thinning this year, so when I mention full crops, that generally means full crops without any thinning, because the frost already thinned the trees to full crops.
Earlystar -22 This window is the earliest we grow. This peach did OK in terms of production. Peaches were thin on the trees, but picked quite a few. This is the best tasting peach I’ve tried for this window. But I don’t think I’m going to plant anymore of this one. Its tree form is just too hard to manage. Because it grows straight up, it takes an extra year to get into production. We end up pruning most of the new wood off young trees to try to train the trees low and spreading. This wouldn’t be an issue for a backyard orchardist, who had more time to tie branches down. The fruit also gets a fair amount of split pits, which were worse this year because of thin cropping.
Spring Snow -21 This is my favorite tasting white peach. Trees practically blank. This variety never produces well, even in the best of years. I’ve only kept it because it tastes so darn good. Really though, I need to start to remove these trees. Fruit which tastes great, but doesn’t produce much, doesn’t pay the bills.
Harrow Diamond -20 These trees did really well this year. Full crops mostly. I’ve been waffling back and forth on which trees I like better for this window (Earlystar or Harrow Diamond). Even though some years the flavor of this peach isn’t quite as good as Earlystar, I am putting Earlystar in second place to Harrow Diamond. Harrow Diamond is much easier to grow, comes into production faster, more consistent production, and has fewer split pits.
PF7a -15 A few peaches, but not much this year. I have one tree of this variety and won’t replace it, when it’s finally removed.
Garnet Beauty -15 Decent production in most trees. One or two trees was pretty thin though. Flavor was OK.
Surecrop -15 Full crop. The problem with this variety is that it produces small fruit, and the flavor sometimes isn’t very good.
Early Redhaven -15 About the same production as Garnet Beauty. Flavor is a teeny bit better than Garnet Beauty.
Risingstar -14 This is the gold standard for this window. Produced full crops this year. Peach has excellent flavor, and virtually no bac. spot. Imo, this is the best peach overall from the Stellar peach breeding program.
Glenglo -13 Production suffered, but did sell quite a few peaches off these trees. Produces big ole nice tasting peaches.
PF Eight Ball Not sure when this one ripens. This would have been the first year these trees produced, but all the fruit was frosted off.
Saturn -5 Trees were nearly blank. I think out of 13 trees, we picked half dozen fruit. This was very unusual for this cultivar. Generally we get full crops from this variety. It’s a great white peach, but tears badly at the stem during picking.
Clayton -5 Mostly full crops this year. These fruit want to drop close to harvest. Best peach flavor for this window. Fruit is a little small.
PF9a -5 Full crops this year. This variety produces like crazy and very consistently. Peaches are big. Flavor is good. This one one of the best selections from Paul Friday.
Harken -4 Blank this year. Clayton or PF9a is better for this window.
Redhaven 0 Slightly thin production, but we still were able to pick a lot of fruit off these trees.
TangOs 0 I have this one ripening with Redhaven. But this flat peach ripens over almost a 3 week period of time from first ripe to last picked. This peach had variable production this year. Some trees full crops, others not much. As with most years, this year the peach inked bad and lots of rot issues. This is a hard peach for us to grow, but the unique flavor and requests from customers keep us growing it.
Starfire +1 Slightly less production this year than Redhaven, It doesn’t have quite the bac. spot issues of Redhaven. Not that Redhaven has tons of bac. spot, but this one is better on that count.
Blazingstar +4 Empty this year.
PF15a +4 Pretty thin crops on these trees. Good tasting peach. Very dark red and can sunburn a few of the peaches some years. Picking them a bit earlier helps with sunburn.
PF14 +4 Blank this year.
PF Lucky13 +4 This peach is a loser. Never produces well. Blank this year. No surprise there.
Johnboy +5 Thin production but picked a few peaches off these trees. Maybe a third of full production. Nice flavor. Big peach.
TangOs II +6 Very thin production. Plus the peaches either rotted, or split, or both. I don’t know that we sold any peaches of this variety. But we only have two trees.
Challenger +7 Maybe 1/2 the production of full crops. Smaller peach with good flavor.
Ernies Choice +11 Full crops. Peach has a lot of acid, which gives it a lot of flavor. But the peach can be tart if we get too much cloudy weather and/or rain near harvest. As always with Ernies Choice, fruit size was very variable this season.
Tubby Dubby +11 This is an unnamed variety we simply call Tubby Dubby. It’s my favorite tasting peach. Production typically is light most years. This year I think we picked a half dozen peaches from four trees.
Blazeprince +11 Terrible producer. This year the one trial tree was blank. I need to get rid of this thing.
PF17 +12 We picked a few peaches off these trees, but not very many. Flavor is good.
Allstar +12 Nothing this year on these trees. This was surprising because normally this variety produces abundant fruit year after year.
Glohaven +13 Produced maybe 1/3 of full crops. Normally this tree is a light producer anyway (about 50% production normally) so it was a surprise to see this much fruit on these trees. As always fruits were huge, with some split pits. We sold several one pounders from this variety this year. Nice tasting peaches.
Harrow Beauty +14 Trees were blank. There are better varieties for this window.
Winblo +14 This is normally somewhat of a light producer for me. But most of these trees had close to full crops this year. Pleasant surprise. Nice sized good tasting fruit. Very evenly sized.
Intrepid +15 Very light production this year. Maybe 10% of full crop.
PF19-007 +19 Trees are still young, but bloomed nicely and set fruit. But none of the fruit survived the freeze.
Loring +19 Blank this year.
Mr. Ed +19 Unnamed peach we named Mr. Ed. Blank this year, but generally a good producer. Better flavor than Contender.
Contender +21 Full crops. This one is easy to overcrop because it sets so heavily. It has a poor tree form, but have planted more Contender because of its very consistent full production. I’m not totally impressed with the flavor of this peach, but it’s decent if not overcropped. Had to be thinned some this year.
Veteran +22 This variety was completely unaffected by the freeze. I don’t think the freeze killed one fruitlet, which was amazing to see. I have just one trial tree and have grafted a bunch more. This variety is also easily overcropped because it sets so heavily. One drawback is the size is a bit small, but the flavor is very good, if not overcropped. Color isn’t the best either. And it drops a little bit.
PF23 +23 Not much fruit at all this year. Maybe 5% production.
Scarletprince +23 Pretty much blank. Even with very few fruit, the variety produces small fruit. Taste is good though.
Baby Crawford +23 This is a real winner for this window. Despite the name, fruit size is OK, as long as not overcropped. Flavor is quite good. Dependable producer. Produced full crops this year. Starting to add more of this variety.
Sweet Breeze +23 Maybe 25% production this year. Big peaches. Very good flavor, especially for a sub-acid peach.
PF24c +24 Full crops this year. These trees took some time to get into production, but once started, have been very consistent producers. Flavor is pretty decent.
Julyprince +25 A big disappointment this year. Normally this variety produces loads of evenly sized nice tasting peaches. This year nothing.
Glowingstar +27 Not much production this year.
Cresthaven +27 Pretty light production. Bac. spot magnet.
Madison +27 Pretty decent production, but not quite full. Nice flavored old timey peach. Uneven size. Shape is slighly weird. Color is poor. Some bac. spot.
PF25 +28 Empty
Redskin +28 Empty
Carolina Gold +29 Maybe 10% production. Beautiful gold peach. Good flavor.
PF27a +32 Empty
Encore +33 Pretty much empty. Maybe 5% production. This was an anomaly for this variety. Normally it produces consist full crops.
PF35-007 +35 Maybe 50% production. Always produces nice sized evenly sized peaches. Good flavor.
Laurol +38 50% production. This variety does get a lot of bac. spot, but generally such a consistent producer of nice bigs good tasting peaches, I forgive that defect. Still the best peach immediately following the Encore window.
Autumnstar +43 About 5% production. Good tasting peach. Nice sized. But rarely sets full crop.
Victoria +45 Blank this year.
Autumnprince +70? I wanted to see if this climate would ripen this peach. A couple trees produced a few peaches. Still not sure, but I don’t think they will completely ripen here.
