Gold Dust is not consistent. This year I let the tree overset and they were good but not great. The squirrels certainly thought they were great though, they stole most of them. Other years they softened too fast on the top compared to the bottom. But many years they were extremely good, at least the ones I was able to eat. Its my first peach tree to ripen and the squirrels seem to call every friend and relative within ten miles to my orchard when it starts to ripen.
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I donāt know between you and @BobVance, who have lost more fruit to critters. I feel bad for both of you. I mostly lost my fruit to bugs or rot.
We have a couple of cats roaming and opnce in a while, a red fox so squirrel pressure is not as bad as your areas. Now, knock on wood.
I think I have more raccoons and Scott has more squirrels. Iāve only gotten 3-4 squirrels this year and rarely see them in the yard, but I think Iām over 10 raccoons and had more than twice that last year. Thankfully, I havenāt seen the groundhog or the rabbits this year, as they are really hard to catch.
I had a lot of chipmunks too (peanut butter wheel worked well, but I wasnāt persistent enough to clear them all), which along with birds cost me most of the strawberries. But, I donāt think the chipmunks take too much tree fruit. This reminds me that I should setup the game camera againā¦
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We ate three ripe tango peaches today. They were quite good juicy, meaty, sweet with balanced acid. They are my earliest peaches so far.
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Sad to say, I have seen two woodchucks/woodchucks this year. We call them Fat Chuck I and Fat Chuck II. They are well fed and big. They are very elusive, impossible to lure them to go in or go near a trap.
I have quite a few bunnies, too.
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Pretty sure your Gold Dust were mislabeled. They are yellowish orange with some red streaking on the outside, not red. On the inside they are yellow with no red in the flesh. They also have a very noticeable pointed butt. This would also explain your lack of sugar as GD is a good early peach!
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This is the same Gold dust from opposite sides. It does have very funny, small, pointed butt. It is picked unripe so I wonāt cut it up yet.
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Do you have any early plums which can get up enough sugar to compete? I had a bug-bitten Lavina today which I thought was pretty good. 14 brix, with interesting flavor.
After I sampled it, I did some research and found that it is supposed to be a mostly yellow plum with a bit of blush. So I went out (in the dark) and picked a few more. Its a heavily loaded tree, so I wonāt miss them if I pick a few too early. And yes, when they are all yellow, they are too early. They are still OK to eat, but not that good. Like what you might get in a store, 10-11 brix and a bit sour.
But, assuming I can keep the animals from it, I could have a lot in a week or two.
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So, ripened Lavina has skin that turns red? I may have two Lavina plums and am trying to figure out when to pick them.
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Iām not sure how dark they normally get. But, the whole tree is covered with yellow fruit now for me, not green (I think- sometimes I have trouble with colorsā¦). It is visually distinctive from my other plums.
Cummins says āGolden yellow with rosy blush; birds donāt see it at all until nearly ripe.ā
One other thing to mention- there was some doubt in the spring if I had mixed up Lavina and Laroda. I can report that they appear to be correctly labeled due to the fruit. Lavina does seem to be a very early bloomer for me, but still came through with a fine fruit-set, even when most other early plums did not (somewhere between none and light set, while Lavina is heavy).
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Here is a description of Lavina from a Russian site, translated: āFruit large for a cherry plum, 30 g, yellow, with dark red blush, glossy. Flesh yellow, of medium firmness, juicy.ā
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I have enjoyed a few Early Magic and not measured the brix but assume it is that high. The tree is difficult to harvest and the crop was light, so Iāve only picked about 50 fruit and have had my fill. A customer who I grafted a piece to a Methely thought it produced the best J. plums heās ever tasted. Strange, heās has an Elephant Heart tree, but EM is like a reliable, early Santa Rosa which has special qualities.
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I find Lavina usually gets nearly all red before they are ripe. Go by how soft they are, not by the color. Those are indeed Lavina, both the coloring up and the unusual flavor aspect.
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I ate a couple of Earli Magic from another site today and it was a few notches above what I have in my tree. More than an early Santa Rosa, it was richer and sweeter than any Santa Rosa Iāve ever eaten. Exceptional. I should note that my tree is not sited in the sunniest spot on my property. I must graft it to a tree in a better spot.
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Jon,
Do you think the pics of Gold Rust I posted are Gold Rust peaches? I received the scionwood from a forum member.
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Hard to say, yours look to round, GD has a very portuding tip that usually looks different from yours. However you could just have a round one. The flesh of GD is pure yellow so that might be the tell tale sign. Check it out when itās ripe.
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It looks like my GD and Iām pretty close by. Ordered a tree from one of DWās sources so it is what they are selling (probably). What distinguishes is not pure yellow flesh, but lots of red and very red skin, the flesh looks orange to me, maybe because of all the red. It also is isnāt very big. It is much more vigorous than any other peach I grow, but then, so is another tree going right next to it (Honey Royale), so it may be the spot.
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I looked at the picture @stan posted the link, it looks like mine including the pointed butt. I agree with @alan that the flesh is more orange than yellow (but how we see color is debatable).
For example, the two pics of Lavina plums that @BobVance posted. The flesh in the first pic was what I would call orange and the second pic was definitely yellow.
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