I AM IN LOVE.
Got this one from Adams County Nursery last year. The description on their site is:
“The fruit ripens about one week after Saturn, with greenish-yellow skin covering the entire surface of the fruit. This variety has been more difficult to grow than TangOs. (NJF16), but the fruit quality is exquisite and worth the extra effort. The tree is vigorous, productive and resistant to bacterial spot.”
I was concerned of the “more difficult to grow” because NJF16 suffers from surface staining/spotting as has been widely reported here.
BUT, anyway, the tree grew and leafed out and grew very well this summer. With the crazy late frost here this year it did bear 6 fruits this year in Z5b NY.
This past weekend, I harvested the six because Saturn was perfect last week. Three of them did not make it out of the orchard. The flesh is creamy clean, the flavor is a VERY strong “peachy” flavor with the perfect amount of sweetness & acid, and juiciness. PERFECTION. I don’t know how it ripens off the tree nor how long it stores because the rest did not make it past dinner time. That is a research project I very much look forward to next season.
The outside was perfect too. FOR FUNGAL issues I sprayed the orchard with Myclobutanil & Captan early on and one spray of INDAR in early July.
FOR INSECTS I used a rotation of rotation of the the new Sevin, Triacizide, and Imidan
Below is a photo of it on the tree and in a bowl. The bowl has TANGO-I, TOKA PLUMS and some SATURNS showing at 6 o’clock.
I’m cutting mine down. To me it’s worthless- Saturn has the high sugar to make a white peach pretty good. TangoII to me is a Barbi peach, exquisite to look at but not much more than that.
That said, in such a hot dry season with light crops, brix are elevated and those you are picking are probably as amazing to eat as look at. I’ve actually just about given up on the original TangO’s, even though it’s probably the most unusual peach I grow and exceptionally good on dry years. At my site, on wet (normal?) years, most of the seeds crack and split open the flesh, leading to rot and rather ugly fruit. Lots of brown spots as well. I manage it on a couple wide open sites with dawn to dusk sun where it does better.
As a general rule, to my palate, orange is better in a peach.
The quality of peaches vary widely from season to season based on precip or lack thereof in the few weeks preceding ripeness. Ask Olpea.
2 points brix can make a world of difference. Highest quality by my standards begins at 13 for peaches and about 15 for nects. FN has a higher standard.
I just ate and excellent peach from my local chain grocer. They claimed they were local and I suspect they came from NJ. Perfect texture, nice size deep orange flesh (for a peach) and probably just about as sweet as my own peaches would be if I had any this year. $1.50 a pound.
Wish I’d purchased more. Recent purchases from CA have been almost inedible. The heat has cooked the fruit on the trees, I guess.
Here in Delaware (and at close by orchards), most of the time my nectarines are in the high teens to low twenties. If we get three dry weeks before harvest, we can get brix in the mid twenties. I have one second leaf, grafted branch of peach only, so can’t give feedback about peaches.
Anyone have pics of newly formed NJF17? I think most of the other donut peaches and nectarines I’ve grown have look like donuts from initial fruit set on.
But, my 3rd year NJF17 (ACN in 2021) looks distressingly pointed…
Not a donut peach. Now I’m trying to figure out what it is. It has just started to ripen recently. Large (7-8 oz), mostly yellow with a slight blush. Bright yellow flesh (I had a non-color blind person confirm). Only ~12 brix, but decent flavor, with a bit of acid kick. Any ideas?
I was thinking Victoria, but it is still a few weeks early for that, while half a dozen of the 20-30 peaches on the tree have fallen.
Edit: Brix appears variable. This one was 14-15 brix, while some of the others in the last day were 10-12 brix. Even the lower brix ones had plenty of flavor and were pretty good. The 14+ brix one was quite good. All are good sized.
Do you have any other peaches to compare as a point of preference (in terms of ripening time)? If so, what was the peach that ripened just before this clearly not-Tangos II?
Also, blossoms? Showy? Nonshowy? take a picture of the leaf glands.
What is texture fresh picked? Is it rock hard crunchy? or soft melting? If it’s crunchy, does it turn to melting after a week on the counter? Or does it go rubbery?
Good thought- I went back to this spring, but couldn’t find any pics of the tree in bloom. I’ll need to wait for next year on that. Texture was on the firm side, but not a non-melting, at least not like Gloria.
In terms of timing, it was about 2.5-3 weeks after Loring. Which puts it slightly early for Victoria, but not by much (+22 vs +45 , so it should have been 23 days instead of maybe 18). But that is fairly close and it is hard to say the exact date where the fruit was best/ripe.
I did speak with one of the guys at the farmer’s market on Saturday. He said that they didn’t get many Victoria’s this year (I assume due to the low temps from a single day in Feb), but he would look around and see if he could find one to bring next week. I’m not sure the best way to describe it (pleasant, with a bit of acid, not a lot of floral/aromatics), but I think I’d be able to identify if a random sample matched it. Based on my description of it (timing, size, mostly yellow with a bit of blush, etc) they though there was a decent chance of a match.
I’m not sure if I liked them so much because I liked the variety, or because the tree was well thinned (mostly just from it being young). Brix got up to ~15, though some were down around 12. Still better than the Carolina Gold that I’ve been picking, which were often in the 9-12 rang (with a few 15-16 randomly thrown in). Interestingly, some people like the very aromatic 10 brix Carolina Gold over a 13 brix Victoria (?).
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