Selena Peach report

General Fruit Growing
21

On topic of copyright/patents etc… there are many situations.

There is a variety of peach that grows true to seed…the reasoning for its existance was to be true to seed… however the variety is patented…only sold by one vendor and that vendor doesnt describe that it does grow true to seed. TruGold.

If you talk about propagating blackberries on FB …you will get overwhelmed by FB police… The fact is that without human intervention blackberries will propagate themselves. Years ago there was a very heated discussion about U of Ark blackberry propagation…it still comes up monthly or more often. There was talk of lawsuits and alot of shaming. However one lady emailed U of Ark and asked simply… can i propagate blackberries for my own use… the answer was yes… just dont sell the plants please. Even though the answer is clear… the debate will go on for infinity. Some members have even been told to use roundup and burn any plants that that tip root…in fear of lawsuit.

Raspberries- i have no clue how anyone could imagine not keeping them from propagating…nor enforce it.

Royalties- Vaughn lists royalty fees for only a few of its peach trees.

  • Add .50 per tree for Galactica
    ** Add $1.00 per tree for Gulfking
    *** Add $2.00 per tree for Gulfcrimson

I would have no issue sending a check for .50 for a scion to whomever owns the patent… isnt that what patents are for…royalties?

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22

Same here, even for $2 royalties, but how can we make that happen? Anonymous money orders?

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23

I bought a Wickson crabapple tree from Mehrabyan Nursery, and am also PLEASED by Surek’s fruit trees. (I know this is not about a peach tree but I just wanted to express my appreciation.) Since I am looking to expand my peaches next year, maybe I will try the Selena

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24

Surek is the best. I ordered 3 peaches from him including the selena and they got lost in the mail. I called him and he sent replacements right away. A few weeks later the original trees came and were still good. I called him and I said I would keep all 6 and we made a deal to pay half for the second round. Very easy to deal with and very friendly.

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25

Sureks prices are cheap too. You cant afford not to shop at his nursery

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26

I would like to find a Selena peach for next year. Is ACN the main source? I can’t find Sureks. When I look up the variety ACN and Mehrabyan are the only the only nurseries that show up.

Thanks

27

That’s Surek’s nursery.

28

Apparently Cumberland Valley Nurseries also has Selena, Tianna, Avalon Nect. (and others from Rutgers breeding program), Carolina Gold, Winblo, July Prince, etc., and plums, pears, and apples for around $10/tree with a minimum of $100 order.
There’s no website. You have to call them for a catalogue and place an order over the phone.

Wish I would have known this last year. It would save me lots of money.

29

Yesterday, one of my employees and I tried a couple Tiana peaches. Tiana is supposed to ripen +33 to +35.

About 6 peaches were still hanging on a tree planted in 2021 (I gave the other 4 peaches to a couple customers).

This particular tree didn’t get picked with the rest of the row because my help didn’t think they were ripe (maybe they weren’t). So they sat there until I saw them yesterday and saw from our orchard map that they were Tiana.

All but one of the Tiana was still very firm, and still on the tree, even though we had harvested peaches +45 the early part of last week. So basically we are +50 and the Tiana still hanging.

Flavor was good, but over-ripe.

The problem for my orchard is that customers don’t like super firm peaches. They don’t know what to do with them. We’ve had a lot of trouble even with normal end of season peaches which have naturally denser, firmer flesh. Customers expect them to soften like early or mid season peaches, so they let them set too long on the counter, waiting for them to soften, until they get over-ripe.

I used to grow Gloria, which is similar type peach from the same breeding program. Gloria set heavy crops, hung well, but it was just too hard for us to sell to customers. And they didn’t want it.

Back then Rutgers called this new type of peach a “stony hard” peach with the idea customers would eat it like an apple - crunchy.

My guess is they changed the name to “neat peaches” because it’s better marketing.

I was going to give Selena a try based on this thread, but trying Tiana yesterday reminded my why I got rid of Gloria.

That said, I can see these peaches working well for a wholesale peach grower who can leave these peaches on the trees longer to allow for higher brix and flavor, but still ship them super firm.

I can also see these peaches working well for a backyard grower, who knows what to expect of them. But so far, for my customer base, it was too hard to try to change their expectations for these hard type peaches, vs. a normal soft peach.

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30

So you cannot educate your customers by giving samples and an explanation? Is the problem, by any chance, cultural? CA growers get away with selling grainy dry late season peaches because that is all there is available, but late peaches I grow just plain taste good to me, even if they are firmer than peaches in prime peach time- and I don’t eat them crunchy but soft-firm.

If something is sweet and juicy and highly flavored I don’t see why it should be hard to adapt to a different peach than one is used to. It’s a similar deal with TangO peach, but my customers always seem to really love that peach (when they happen to not split and rot on the tree). Maybe Tiana doesn’t get as soft as Victoria- my signature late season peach. Have you tried it?

31

I think so. Even TangOs was hard to get customers to try it. I had to give away a lot of fruit to get any interest. There is a fair amount of interest now in those, but we still have trouble selling all of them from about a dozen trees. We have no trouble at all selling any yellow peaches (except the hard ones like Gloria). White peaches and nectarines we also have had some difficulty selling when we raised a lot of them.

Yes and no. Sometimes I’ve had 20 customers in line this summer, working as fast as possible to try to minimize wait times. It doesn’t give a lot of explanation per customer. Even when times are slower, it’s difficult to change customer expectations. People expect a peach to soften to a mid or early season type peach.

Towards the end of the season I found myself sounding like a broken record. “The end of the season peaches are much firmer than mid or early season peaches. The flesh is denser and won’t soften like mid or early season peaches, etc, etc”

Even after all of that, I’d find people would come back a week later and still waiting for the peaches to “ripen” on the counter, to my dismay. Some of their peaches went bad and I gave money back. I’m sure I’d have more issues with the new harder/firmer peaches from Rutgers. I faced the same with Gloria.

As I mentioned, my situation is somewhat unique. I think these peaches will be a tremendous boon to wholesale peach growers. And to backyard growers, if they know what to expect.

I plan on keeping a few Tiana at least for a while. But so far these harder peaches don’t fit my customer base.

I’ve grown Victoria for quite a few years. My first Victoria were planted in 2012.

I reported on it in a recent 2022 peach evaluation thread I started.

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32

So reading this thread with an eye towards getting a couple more peach varieties, I have contender and red haven now.

  1. Do you harvest Tiana and Selena based on date and color not firmness?

  2. Are they both peel-able? I assume they need some time on the counter to soften a bit?

TIA.