It didn’t sugar up, so it was a little tart. That was a problem all summer long with many peach varieties. Some did really great and were nice and sweet. Others didn’t have the sugar and so were tart.
I’ve been raising Encore for a few years now and normally it’s a nice late peach. It does produce well and sizes nicely. It didn’t have the sugar this year, but so many other peaches had the same problem, I’m not holding that against it. Even Laurol and Victoria didn’t have the sugar they probably should have, but they were better than Encore.
It was an unusual year. However, there were some peaches which had really great flavor despite the weather.
@Olpea, thanks for the vote of confidence on Victoria. I think that will be the one new peach I add this coming spring. @Matt_in_Maryland, I haven’t tried Fairtime.
O’Henry is usually fantastic for me, but for the first time they rotted badly this year.
Mrs. G47,
Thanks so much for sharing your pictures and your comment above. I sure hope I don’t eat all my jam before winter sets in. LOL. I hope that I can get this tree before it sells out!
Don’t worry Olpea, I’m not defensive of my clones and happy to cut them down for or graft them over to better varieties. Of course my Encore is a fully mature tree that feeds many people- it will be a few more years for a replacement to pick up for that.
In ref. to Indian Free from RT I can only tell you of my own experience from this spring/early summer. I was going to order from them in early may for one Indian Free along with a Blackgold cherry and Tomcot apricot and they sold out of all of them! I got a nice surprise when on their website which I checked daily at one point in late may had said that they would be getting some many sold out trees back in stock soon but only in a small amount.
On one hand I lucked out and they had all three trees back in stock for about a week! I ordered all of them but the Indian Free’s roots were almost non existent! The site currently has them on lovell rootstock only and I got mine on Citation at the time. I kept three scaffold limbs, pruned off the rest and it’s still alive but hasn’t put on much growth. The tree I got from RT had Dave Wilson tags on it.
I am NOT saying that if you order one from here that you also will get one with butchered roots! I am just telling you of my one time experience and that just sometimes we just plain old get a charlie brown x-mas tree. hahaha
My Encore had fruit for the first time this year. It was OK, but nothing special. I think the brix was in the 11-12 range, though the size was good. Mine was all ripe around the first week of September. The Carolina Gold from the previous week or two (which almost overlapped) was much better in flavor, though much smaller.
I also have PF Big George (Redhaven + 56 → around Sept 25th), but the tree died from borers this summer. I budded a backup last fall, as the original tree didn’t seem in great shape and got a single peach this year. Of course wildlife knocked it down and took a few bites in early September. I was happy to note that what remained was still indeed unripe (leaves hope for a later harvest).
I would like to find another good peach or two at this time of year. I did plant a Autumn Glo apricot this spring as an experiment. Dave Wilson says August 7- September 1 in Hickman CA, so I figured it would be a late September or October apricot here (if it ripens at all). So, while I don’t have any great confidence in it (also rated zone 7, for which I am borderline), I wanted to give it a shot, as very late season apricots would be extremely nice to have.
I got three Big George from Grandpa’s Nursery this spring. All three started to leaf then promptly died. They were the only trees which did that this spring. To their credit Grandpa’s orchard refunded my money without any hassle. They are reputable folks.
That’s good to hear about Grandpas. The one time I ordered from them I was very pleased with the trees.
The PF Big George was a 3rd year tree for me, so it’s not something I can blame the nursery (Cummins) for. This spring I started painting all the trunks, but it was far too late for this tree. It probably wasn’t the best spot for a peach anyways, as it’s the 4th (of the 6 I planted there three years ago) that I’ve lost in that area. In the rest of the yard, the only peaches I’ve lost were potted. I think I’ll use jujube’s as replacements there…
This is based on two orders from two separate nurseries, so I’m guessing it was DW’s doing but don’t know. The IF I tasted this year is in its second season, but the tree and the Ohenry next to it are half the size of smaller diametered, full rooted trees I got from Adams the same season.
My impression is it is the retail nurseries doing the root pruning. Bay Laurel told me themselves that they were doing it. Also several places don’t root prune the DWN stock, I don’t remember who exactly but I think Sanhedrin and Trees of Antiquity never did. ToA sells some DWN non-apple trees.
Gramps is great. All they need to do is lower their prices to Vaughns level
The two Sanguines might be good substitutes for IF also for jam and freezing Indian Blood may be a better option and does ripen sooner than IF. My IF was probably mostly pollinated by Arctic Glo nectarine. A very similar fruit to IF, except a nectarine. It ripened in early August. Anyway the seeds to IF crossed with Arctic Glo (IF is not self fertile-it has to be crossed with something?) may ripen earlier and give a similar fruit. I’m going to try and grow them out. And yes my IF is rock hard still too.
Also again if you like Indian Free, I would try Arctic Glo, To me it was the best stone fruit this season. And it ripens a lot earlier.
I usually hate fruit that is over ripe, a few Arctic Glo’s were damaged and became ripe quickly, by the time I seen them they were over ripe, and they tasted fantastic over ripe! Dead ripe it’s wonderful. Under ripe is beats most others, at least it did this year. The only stone fruit that really impressed me was AG and Flavor King. I will always grow them.
Thanks Drew. My season is longer than both yours and Alan’s which is why I am surprised it might not do well here. It has been in the high 50’s this week, but is going back up into the sixties next week for a about two weeks for a nice Indian Summer. I really want specific fruit trees. My roses grow right into November. Oh well. Thanks again.
Mrs. G, your season may be longer in frost free days but it is shorter than mine in degree units. I’m not sure how well IF will ripen up in Oct, but I will let you know- I still have about 5 rock hard peaches on my tree.
Distance between trees becomes more important as days become shorter as a low sun casts much more shade.
Drew, Indian Blood (Cling) is a very different peach than all the other red-fleshed peaches I have grown, it is very hard-fleshed and lacks the sugars. It does cook up well, but it will still be a bit “chunky”. All the other red-fleshed peaches I have grown are very similar in sweet/sour/hardness/flavor.
Thanks Alan, and Scott, now I understand. It will be interesting to see how ‘Black Boy’ peach from Raintree does here next year. It is in a south facing corner of my rose garden and will get sun all day long. I hope that will help.
