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.
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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.
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I don’t grow peaches. But I’ve eaten Cresthaven peaches from a grower at the Jonesboro, AR Farmers Market, and they were delicious!
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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.
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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.
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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
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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.
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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.
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It is not one recommended in this short list for home growers. Peaches & Nectarines | Home & Garden Information Center
Can you find a link to a more complete list? I can’t.
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Sure…
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
https://web.extension.illinois.edu/fruit/peaches.cfm?section=tree
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.
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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.
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You have an unusual definition of a troll- But I guess what I’m about to write you will consider trolling- you don’t like being challenged, but my challenges aren’t to belittle you as you seem to think- I’m only trying to get as close to genuine information here as I can- the quality of Cresthaven isn’t very important to me, but the quality of info on this forum is, and I apologize for my obsession if it offends you.
IMO, there are no real experts on how peaches perform in universities that exceed anyone who spends just as much time evaluating peaches as they do. Often in Clemson-type evaluations they talk about the brix of peaches with numbers that are absurdly low. Land Grant university experts are primarily paid to advise commercial growers. They are not experts on producing the highest quality fruit in the manner a home grower does. They tend to breed brightly colored fruit that ripens in a way that doesn’t require multiple pickings and ships well.
That guy in Clemson probably doesn’t know nearly as much about how a peach variety will perform in your orchard as the nearest commercial grower to you, or any serious hobbyist near you that has experimented with a wide range of varieties based originally on what a wide range of “experts” suggested but followed up by experience in their own orchards for several decades. To me, the folks with the most expertise on taste are small commercial growers who make their living selling superior fruit for a premium price directly to their customers from orchards that they spend most of their time in when they aren’t selling their fruit-. people like Olpea. Desmond Layne is only knowledgeable about peach performance in the domain where he tests them and his focus is on commercial performance of varieties. His evaluations haven’t proven an especially useful guide for me, and I’m best off running with Rutgers because one of their two test orchards is close to my own climate. Olpea’s evaluations don’t tend to be very useful to me either, but they certainly would be if I grew peaches in the mid-west.
It doesn’t take a pomologist to evaluate how fruit tastes and they don’t get their pedigrees by exhibiting the talents of a great “taster”-, experts on producing wine are not the people who are paid to evaluate their quality on the palate.
All that said, I’m not a fan of videos, and prefer text, unless the video was produced by a talented expert on videography 
.
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This is a local to me small commerical grower that make a living selling fruit directly to their customers.
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It looks like he didn’t take the time to thin them
That doesn’t look like a small operation that sells all the fruit they grow directly to customers. I bet some of those peaches are being shipped out. I don’t think you can treat ripe peaches the way those are being handled and that they are hard as rocks. .
So you do think this is a competition, somehow. That does look like a tiny peach- mine are way oversized this year and often full of water- half my crop I let rot. Some have weighed about a pound with most of the crop bigger than you see in stores. Thinning is expensive for commercial growers, but those peaches seem too small to obtain a premium price or to achieve supreme quality.
3 inches as stated clearly. Which according to the text as you prefer…is its intended size.
From all of their clearly positive likes, loves and comments it appears that their intended size and obvious quality seems to be working for them. Which is likely their goal.
No. I have just been waiting for you to share your experience with this cultivar. So i guess i will have to share with others your experience for you.
"I manage what I believe to be a Cresthaven that must be 50 and still cranks out hundreds of pounds of absolutely delicious peaches. "
Yup, you think this is a debate, and I guess in a way it is because you’ve made it one, even searching up old posts I’ve made… wow. Of course, I’ve played along- you probably think I instigated it by asking for clarification from you. Do you ever go to farm markets where people come to buy highest quality of fruit? How about the roadside stands in your area- do they sell 3" diameter peaches there? Certainly that is not what Olpea shoots for or what I grow. Is that the size you consider to be best in peaches?
That size does not represent the potential of that peach, of course, and if those peaches have something over 14 brix, I’d be very impressed, but in my experience that’s pretty tough to do if you don’t do much thinning.
However, I will be happy to find out how you rate your Cresthaven fruit in a few years. I’m sure it’s a fine peach, if one of many.
BTW, this year I figured out that old tree cannot be Cresthaven, it bears nearer to Red Haven’s window, but about a week later. I’m puzzled on what it is, because it gets up such high sugar. And the peaches only get up to about 3-4" diameter, even when thinned- but that may be because it’s old. It has the big, beautiful blossoms and high flavor of Loring, but ripens sooner and is too young to be one of its sports, unless there was an early Loring before the John Boy series.
Gosh darn they’re small.
That’s not what I originally said, but I’m sure you can infer what I did say.
I’m surprised that place would get anywhere near full price for that fruit.
It sounds silly to judge fruit by size alone but from what I keep reading underthinning peach trees dramatically effects taste…and not in a good way, and it looks like that place didn’t thin anywhere near enough.
Bad grower practices really are embarrassing.
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