My FB feed was loaded this year with excellent reports of Cresthaven. My most local orchards in WV seem to favor this peach for some reason and seems everyone loves them. I did a search on FB and same thing for the most part…nothing but praise and desire for this peach. Hard to find a bad report for this peach unless you read peach reports on this forum.
Released in 1963 in Michigan…and is supposedly a good cold hardy peach.
Yellow flesh melting acidic tang…and very sweet. Also ‘excellent performer’.
I think i will add one. I also like the spacing in this orchard.
Compared to what? There’s a lot of peach breeding under the bridge since1963 and it seems to me they keep getting better- at least some of them. I’m looking for high brix and deep orange flesh. But some of the older varieties are less susceptible to brown rot and even bird predation (not so red).
On the other hand, a few older varieties do very well in Dave Wilson taste tests. I like Loring a lot. O’Henry is not a great performer here but is another oldie but goodie pretty late peach. I don’t know Cresthaven for some reason, although I’ve grown a few in my nursery in the past. Maybe it’s as good as the older varieties I do like.
A commercial grower who was my original mentor told me all the released Haven series are quality peaches and relatively hardy- but that was over 30 years ago. I would still like to hear a comparative evaluation from a grower of many varieties, including new releases. Breeders have been trying to improve on the Haven series for a long time and in climates more similar to yours than where the Havens come from. .
Im not saying its ‘The Best Ever’ as some threads on other fruits claim… im just saying that if you do some investigating on the major sources of information nowadays like social medias and youtube etc… most all reviews seem pretty great… I personally like the acid kick with sweet… but not everyone does. The review below reflects what i am seeing on those media outlets that its raised for farm markets. Obviously it does well here…in my state which to me is a plus.
One of the few peaches that Fedco sells… so obviously it might be good for cold climates… but as the video i posted above states…it also does very well in SC according to Clemson.
Im ok with a very cold hardy peach that can tolerate heat… that has great flavor.
From Grandpas Orchard -
The Cresthaven peach is a firm, yellow to red highly colored variety for late season. The fruit is yellow-fleshed, freestone, and shows considerable red around the pit. This is a vigorous, productive tree that has fair tolerance to bacterial spot. Good for canning and freezing. While many varieties have better color than Cresthaven, its flavor is one of the best and many people raise it still for farm markets.
All of the “Haven” peaches were bred in Michigan by the famous Dr. Stanley Johnston, who Grandpa knew and respected. Grandpa said that if it hadn’t been for Stanley, he probably never would have raised as many peaches as he did.
I don’t grow cresthaven, but I bought a half bushel of it from a local orchard. It’s an OK peach, taste wise. But just after I finished a half bushel of excellent Loring from the same orchard, cresthaven tasted relatively bland and boring.
My Nanaimo peach was surprisingly good. Black boy aka NZ Indian peach tasted great and was very productive. Finally Sweet Bagel gave me a half bushel this year. Sweet bagel tasted so wonderful now I regret that I had grafted half of the tree to pluots and apricots. But as everyone already knows, Sweet Bagel is very disease prone to PLC, scab, bacteria spot and finally brown rot. But I found that about 3 sprays of fungicide in growing season and one spray of copper would be enough to control, thanks to @alan ’s spray schedule.
Cresthaven and other “Haven” peaches are all heavily grown in Colorado and I’ve seen them also used for some of the NC-140 peach rootstock research. I think a lot of people are probably just emulating what they’ve seen in those places and then people copy them and so on.
Like i said earlier the only bad reports that i can find are in this forum. Nothing wrong with that at all as most here have tried many more fruits than the average citizen.
I do know that if you read Olpea’s reports that some peaches have good years and some have bad… and that various climates and conditions will give various results.
I think someone recently bought online a box of Colorado peaches and gave them a poor report… not sure if its fair to never want a Colorado peach… and that their experience is reflective of every crop.
I do think that Cresthaven wants more fertilizer than other peaches from some stuff i read… maybe your local orchard didnt know that… and i have no idea if it would make a difference or not.
I imagine Cresthaven specifically needs help.
My biggest problems with it are the bacterial spot and the fact that it’s a nutrient hog…redhaven’s a breeze compared to Cresthaven…Redhaven’s the industry standard for a reason,
Interesting. I have ~10 different varieties of peach tree. I have one tree each of redhaven and cresthaven. The cresthaven is a bushy beast! More so than any of the others, it seemed to put on growth extra fast and vigorously. I cannot comment on the taste, since it is still young and this year I got no peaches because of late frost - but maybe people like how quickly it grows.
Regardless of this forums reviews I think i will give it a try.
Its been around for 60 years and every major reputable nursery still seems to have it.
Clemson says its a fantastic peach… so do most reviews on social medias.
The signs are there that its worth growing. Not saying its the best at anything or better than others… maybe some years it is and some years it isnt.
The signs are there that is a very cold hardy peach and also performs well in triple digit heat as far as i can tell. So may come in handy for the strange weather we have been having at the minimum.
Im not planting a whole orchard of them like my local peach orchards are doing… just one tree.
Most likely you’ll be happy with the results. Despite my griping about it, Cresthaven’s actually a decent peach and it definitely holds its own against other peaches in the season that don’t color as well.
Taste is subjective, I’ve enjoyed it, it definitely has the quintessential peach flavor.
At some point in its life Cresthaven under the conditions I’ve grown needs a little extra fertilizer.
If bacterial spot’s an issue in your area I’ve definitely had an issue with bacterial spot.
Like I said, you’re going to enjoy it so don’t let whatever issues someone who’s not you has had ruin it.
The only other Haven I’ve tried besides Redhaven is Halehaven which was very good. Later than Redhaven but firmer and better taste. I have a graft of Newhaven somewhere in my orchard and just planted a Cresthaven. If I can find a Halehaven tree I’m going to plant one next year.
Have you had issues with getting good fruit set in Halehaven?
Stanley Johnston bred Halehaven from J.H. Hale, which notoriously requires a pollinator.
Redhaven, which is a cross of Halehaven x Kalhaven has JH Hale as a grandparent but sets a crazy amount of fruit. Just goes to show you’ll never know what you’re gonna get
A little info on the ‘Haven’ series of peaches from South Haven Experiment station.
'During his career, Johnston evaluated more than 27,000 peach seedlings, according to Okie, and released eight, all with “haven” in their name. Redhaven was his third release in a line that started with Halehaven in 1932 and Kalhaven in 1938. A cross between the first two resulted in Redhaven. Later releases include Fairhaven, Sunhaven, Richhaven, Glohaven, Cresthaven, Sweethaven, Newhaven, and Jayhaven, the latter three released by his successor R. L. Andersen after Johnston died.
Johnston started working with an old variety, J.H. Hale, which had Elberta as a parent, and crossed it with local varieties called Kalamazoo (to get Kalhaven) and South Haven (to get Halehaven).
Writing about it later, Johnston said the Redhaven got its large fruit size, firm flesh, tough skin, bright yellow ground color, and a moderate amount of bright red skin color from J.H. Hale; its earliness, hardiness, and bright red skin color from South Haven; and hardiness and a strong tree structure from Kalamazoo.’
Hale Haven available now for Fall Planting at a fair price.
The nice thing about Glohaven (for me anyway because I order 50 to 100 trees at a time) is that commercial nurseries such as ACN still offer it and besides being a storied decent peach it has a very nice size.
I spent 5 mins finding these lists for you that Cresthaven peach is listed on on and recommended by their respected Universities.
New Jersey
Illinois
Georgia
Pennsylvania
Ohio
Virginia
Utah
Oklahoma
There are reports on this forum from Kansas… the closest i can get to that location is Missouri and the University of Missouri has a very short list that they even talk about. Cresthaven is one of them. It is recommended to grow Cresthaven due to its disease resistance.
For my personal state of WV… Cresthaven is one of three cultivars talked about for our Almost Heaven Fruits.
So i am surrounded by states that recommend this variety even my own. I feel pretty confident that it is worth growing one tree for my personal consumption.
Like i have said earlier… i have no doubt that there are better varieties available. I am just saying that it makes just about every major university list as well as offered by respected nurseries. It also appears to be a cultivar that can do well in the North as well as the South…even the West.
I only became interested in this cultivar due to the bombardment of positivity in my local social media feeds… and began my interest after seeing that this forum for the most part hasnt really discussed it.
From what i can gather…its worth considering more than not.
This thread is open and welcome to dispute or concur.
Why did you paste and copy all that? The Rutgers list didn’t say anything positive about Cresthaven and did about other varieties. I was hoping for only things that reflected what you were saying about Cresthaven… that it is an exceptionally good peach. I’m not saying none of your links lead to that, but why lead me onto a goose chase? I’m just trying to clarify where these very positive descriptions are coming from and what they are saying about other varieties. You started this topic about Cresthaven, I though you’d be happy to clarify.
because you asked me to find a link with a more complete list…when you said that you couldnt… i felt very sorry for you and helped you out.
It didnt really have to because in the opening statement it says…
These suggested varieties are listed by season of ripening in southern New Jersey and days after Redhaven.
My take was that they took the time to make the list…why put something on there that wasnt suggested? Perhaps its a NJ thing.
Hope is a wonderful thing…keep at it.
Perhaps all of these universities are wrong. Perhaps every nursery that carries them are fraudulent. Perhaps its a conspiracy. Perhaps everyone that is posting good reviews is in on the conspiracy.
Experts and Universities mostly. Clemson for example took the time, money, and effort to review this peach in video form and is currently on their website
.
The review was by Dr. Desmond Layne who is one of the worlds leading experts in tree fruit horticulture. His credentials are online and available. He is known as a Peach Expert. He is a pomologist… and his nickname is PeachDoctor if you want to follow him on various platforms.
Im just posting what real experts say about it. I have no desire to clarify nor feed the Trolls.
