Anyone here have these cultivars of apricots featured in this article?
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Are these the same or similar to Afghan Apricots? Those are far superior to others Iāve tried.
They might be similar as Tajikistan is next to Afghanistan and Uzbekistan, which are known for very good stone fruits. Our CRFG have Tashkent Nectarines and Peaches which are all very good and came from the same area.
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You can find dried Afghan apricots in an Indian store. They are really good and much better than the ones found elsewhere.
Raintree sells the Afghan apricot trees. Too bad they wonāt do well in my area. CA central valley is probably the perfect location for growing it.
https://raintreenursery.com/spring/hunza-apricot-citation-c475
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Wow was that article good! I LOVE a good apricot, but like he described others experiences, they are the most elusive. I have had a truly amazing apricot probably twice. What I wouldnāt give to try all those strangely colored apricots!
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I have a young apricot tree HUNZA.
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I have fruited several of the Hunza (Pakistani) types, all were small and orange and very sweet; they were not that shiny though. Good yellow ones include Iranian varieties Shalah and Lasgerdi Mashaad. I think these Iranian varieties are similar to the ones referred to in the article, they are more shiny. āAfghanistanā is similar, but not as shiny as these Iranian ones. All of these central asian apricots take a long time to fruit productively, treat them like pear trees not apricots when you are planning when you harvest will start. I found that the biggest problem; they are also prone to rots.
There are some western apricots which also have minimal fuzz and a bit of shine. Orangered is somewhat shiny for example. I think it might have some central asian apricot in its parentage.
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Great line: āI donāt even call those things they sell in supermarkets āapricotsā anymore,ā he replied. āCommercial apricots today are just for decorating stores."
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Maybe we could create the dream apricot by backcrossing a very sweet Middle Eastern Apricot with a 50/50 Nectarine x Apricot hybrid? The goal is to obtain the firmness and juicyness of the nectarine with the sweetness of the apricot. And thatās one of my goals. Iām planning to backcross my Nectarcot with a Middle Eastern Apricot.
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Craig Ledbetter at USDA has been crossing lots of these eastern apricots to get some of their desirable features into US apricots. As apricots migrated from China to central asia to middle east to east Europe to west Europe to the US, on each step the gene pool got narrower and narrower. So its a good move to get more of these diverse genes into our apricots.
Here is a very detailed article on all the different kinds of apricots out there if you want to know more:
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/236791022_Apricots
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How do white cots behave when grafted on mature cot trees? Do they still take many years to produce? Also, is any of your trees on citation? It is supposed to induce precocity.
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I have a white apricot from Adams that Scott said was bland although I found it extraordinary sweet and good based on about 2 apricots from the variety Iāve happened to taste. I forget its name now (probably Sugar Pearls) and Adams has stopped selling it and doesnāt even list it in its ripening sequence chart, but it is a Rutgers introduction using Zard as a parent or close relative. Rutgers would not have released it if it tended to produce the low brix fruit where theyāe extensively tested it- on the contrary, they suggest brix levels in the '20ās as being typical. So impressed was I by the flavor of those 2 fruit that Iāve given a tree part of the limited space on my south wall this fall. If it bears fruit the first year I will report. My tree is loaded with flower buds and the variety seems typically precocious in the manner of most cots I grow.
A quick search shows it is offered by several nurseries including Cummins, but they are sold out. Adams also lists it as āout of stockā, but it isnāt in their current catalog so I donāt know if they still propagate it.
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Yes, I read the Rutgers description of Sugar Pearls and grafted it last year. It grew very well, and I am hoping to get a few fruits from it this year. Bob Purvis told me it is one of his top apricots.
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I donāt have much on citation, I used to but most of those roots eventually died. Many were grafted onto mature trees and it still takes a long time ā¦ just like pears. Also they donāt just all of a sudden start fruiting, it takes many years to build up to a good crop. Note this is in my climate, in the west my guess is they do better. A few white apricots I never saw a good crop on, Sukphany and Afghanistan never produced much. I replaced my Afghanistan after 12 years of little crops. Maybe in 15 years it would have finally started producing!
Re: Sugar Pearls, it was not nearly as sweet or flavorful as my other white cots which is why I took it out. Maybe I should have given it a few more years, it didnāt fruit for long. It is much more precocious than the middle eastern varieties. I look forward to your report on it, Ahmad!
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Purvis gives it a high flavor rating. Oops, I just noticed that Ahmad already said that. He offers scionwood, I guess.
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Yes, I got my scions from him.
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Is shalah the same as shalakh from Armenia?
Mirsunjeli Late is the only glabrous apricot I know of sold here, it produced for me in upstate New York. It was outstanding, in my opinion, but the tree got bulldozed by deer this year and snapped at the graft. The Arboreum Company sells it, but not every year. Canāt wait to replace my tree!
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Too bad, I would have asked you for bud wood 