I’m near Atlanta, GA, where I understand that disease resistance is the most important trait to look for in a peach tree. So I’m shopping for peach trees, and finding varieties like Harrow Diamond, which boasts resistance to bacterial spot, brown rot, and perennial canker. Sounds great. But it was bred in Canada! I see some other varieties from the same Canadian program, nectarines, apricots… Can I trust these things to really be disease resistant here? I’d think southern-bred peaches would be better adapted, but those variety descriptions I’ve seen don’t list disease resistance. Does that mean nothing is resistant to southern diseases?
Peaches are more adapted to heat than say apples. So for apples many northern ones don’t do well in the south, but less so for peaches. I find the California-bred peaches are the main ones to watch out for, in that dry climate they get very few diseases and many of the varieties from there don’t do well in the east. But Canada still gets plenty humid in the summer and they need similar disease resistance as southeastern climates.
There are also many disease-resistant peaches bred in the south, North Carolina has Carolina Gold, Winblo, Clayton, Carolina Belle. Arkansas has the White series, etc.
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I grow 9 different varieties of Southern peaches with no disease
whatsoever. Go to Clemson or UGA’s websites and they’ll have
a list from which you can choose. .
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If you’re looking for good peaches for GA, UGA has bred disease resistant peaches, well adapted for the South. They’re the prince series. Julyprince, Flameprince, Juneprince, etc.
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Is Julyprince among the disease resistant ones? Could you list the 9 disease free varieties? THanks!
I’ve never had diseases on any of my peaches, and I don’t spray
for disease, only for insects. IMHO the best of the Prince series is July.
But my favorite peach is Winblo.