Choosing an apricot for San Jose, CA

Hi everyone,

I am looking for an apricot variety that would be suitable for the chill hours in San Jose/zone 9b/sunset zone 15 in addition to the Blenheim I already have. Where I am, we get a consistent average of about 400 chill hours and 45 to 60 chill portions.

I’ve compared the Dave Wilson and Andy Mariani descriptions to reviews on this forum and elsewhere, and haven’t come much closer to a decision than “maybe Moorpark” or something from Tajikistan.

Also, are CandyCots available to home growers? My initial research says no, but I thought it would be worth it to ask.

Thanks so much for your help!

*** UPDATE: ***
I’ve since purchased and put in the ground a Burgundy plum, Santa Rosa plum, and another Blenheim, as well as a Honey Babe peach in a nice big pot. I’m thinking I’ll get a Moorpark next, and am on the lookout for a Golden Nectar plum to round out the start of my backyard stone fruit orchard.

I grew up in the area, and most people grew Blenheim, but my friend did grow Moorpark and it didn’t fruit every year but it fruited often enough. It was the favorite apricot for my friends parents.

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Thanks, @JamesN ! Do you know if your friend’s Moorparks had an issue with uneven ripening, or if the uneven ripening is ignorable?

I’m in San Jose as well. After some research (no personal experience), I planted Moorpark and Cot-N-Candy last year. The plan is to graft Blenheim on one of the scaffolds. I ordered TomCot this year and plan to graft Nicole and Apache (likely next year) for early season cots.

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Uneven ripening IME is more of a quirk than a problem. You will definitely eat the whole apricot and enjoy all of it.

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I’m also interested in grafting once I get a tree established a bit. Does your area get enough chill for Moorpark? I’m worried my location (West SJ near 880/280) won’t get cold enough for fruit 5 out of 6 years.

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I’m am not too far from you, closer to Prusch park. I heard from CRFG folks that Moorpark produces fruits for most years. I have to see for myself how they perform here.

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Excellent, thanks so much for the info.

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Do you mean Dynamic Model chill portions? I’m in Tracy and we have 700-800 chill hours and 50-60 chill portions. All apricot varieties do very well here.

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Hi @Stan, yes I am referring to Dynamic Model chill portions. On a good year, we get 60, but typically it seems to be around 50.

You seem to be a big fan of Moorpark, is that correct? I’d also love to try my hand at grafting scions in the future, hopefully including your new Anya varieties!

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It’s interesting that in my location we have about twice as many chill hours but a similar number of chill portions compared to San Jose. Dynamic Model is considered to be more accurate in estimating the amount of chill that trees actually need.

Yes, Moorpark is very good here. At this point I grow about 70 named apricot varieties and about 40 apricot seedlings, although a good portion of these are new and have not fruited yet (or have not fruited enough to make a judgement on their quality). I’m looking forward to tasting more of them! :slight_smile:

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I grew goldkist when I lived in San Jose. Very productive and a lot earlier than my Blenheim

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The chill portion numbers are very interesting indeed! Perhaps the weather in San Jose trends on the more stable/consistent side?

Looking forward to seeing the results of your apricot trials as well!

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We are little to the north and Moorpark was great last year. We had about 8 varieties in the range of 600 or less required chill and we had to thin the fruits. Only Orangered seems to require higher chill and has fruited only few but they were large and colorful. We are keeping eye this year and already grafted another Moorpark to one branch.

As others mentioned, grow strong rootstock and experiment with varieties by grafting. Until you get to few mature trees (rootstock), bareroots is easy and affordable way to taste fruits and have scions to graft first few years. Think to extend the season. Earli Autum was great late season. We had Apricot (or Aprium) from Early May to later August.

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What are the varieties you are growing and which ones are productive among them?

I started growing fruits and veggies about a year ago, and am just coming up on my first season of fruit production. So far I have collected the following, with results only on citrus:

Citrus:
Fukushu kumquat
Nagami kumquat
Centennial variegated kumquat
Gold Nugget mandarin
Sanguinelli blood orange
Variegated Pink Eureka lemon
Meyer lemon
Bearss lime
Australian finger lime (microcitrus)
All kumquats and the blood orange have produced very well this year, and I got one variegated lemon. Nothing from the others yet.

Figs :
Panachée
Violette de Bordeaux
Excel
Red Isreal
Yolo Bypass

Stone Fruit :
Santa Rosa plum
Burgundy plum
Blenheim apricot
Honey Babe miniature peach

Blueberries :
Sunshine Blue
Peach Sorbet
Pink Icing

Grapes : Ruby Seedless & Princess
Raspberries : Caroline & Fall Gold
Blackberries : Olallieberry
Pomegranate : Parfianka

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You have a lot of really cool citrus. I am surprised how many lemons/limes you have. Most people here have one lemon or lime tree and they have no idea what to do with all the fruit beyond some basic uses like tea or just on the kitchen table for fragrance. We use them heavily in the kitchen on a daily basis, but we still can’t keep up with all the fruit from neighbors/friends!

I am trying more kumquats and they are growing on me. A gardener I hired to help clean up behind our fence broke the Nagami graft I had going on my lemon tree. Now, I need to write another check to CCPP next season :disappointed_relieved: How do you rate your different varieties of kumquats?

Finally, do you grow your blueberries in the ground or pots? Any special care for keeping pH low? I ignored them thinking they are too much of a fuss to deal with, but my daughter eats buckets of them throughout the year. No sign of her growing out of it so far. Now, I am thinking if I should build a raised bed just for growing some blueberries.

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What are your 8 varieties of Apricots/Apriums? How do you rate them for flavor and productivity?

For me, Nagami is great simply because it is so productive. The flavor is decent, pretty much the standard for kumquats.

Fukushu is my favorite kumquat because the fruits are so large and juicy, the taste is amazing, and the rounded leaves and compact habit make it very ornamental. Both Nagami and Fukushu resist citrus leaf miner as well, which decimated my poor little mandarin.

The variegated kumquat, however, has the best flavor and texture. It’s unfortunately not very vigorous and healthy, being a variegated plant, but it has a decent number of fruits on it right now and grew an amount during the last season.

I’m in the market for a Meiwa kumquat, which is I think a hybrid of Nagami and Fukushu and supposedly the best tasting. All are in pots.

My blueberries are in pots as well. For acidity, my soil mixture is about 40-50% pine pellets, which also are great for moisture retention. They expand when you get them wet, so I wet and crumble them before adding perlite, bark chips, and a bit of compost and mycorrhizae. I’ll probably repot it every second or third year with fresh pine pellets since I use tap water, which raises the pH over time.

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Blenheim, Moorpark, Orangered, Katy, Royal Rosa, Tropic Gold, Tomcot and Earli Autum. Also, Leah Cot and Flavor Delight. This year we should have other varieties to fruit including those with higher chill requirements (Monterose and Brittany) but they are icing on the cake at this point.

All were productive except Orangered. They range in texture, acidity and sweetness profile but if you manage to get them to fully ripe on the dryer side, they will all taste from very good to exceptional. One way is to plant over 9-12” raised tree well/bed to force roots to go deep for water and water less.

Nothing will taste like mid season Blenheim and Moorpark but enjoying tree ripe apricot for 4 months is joyful. Also, not everybody in family likes “mushy” Blenheim and they prefer other firmer texture.

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