Tag: Reliance Peach

First Peaches

First Peaches, 2021 (Source: Geo Davis)

It’s but a month and a day after Independence Day and we’re eating our first peaches of the season. Eureka!

So memorable a moment each summer when I savor the first bites of the first peaches of the season that I’ve begun to wonder if we might need to create a floating holiday. It’s hard to conceive of a better cause for celebration.

First Peaches, 2021 (Source: Geo Davis)

First Peaches Haiku

Summer’s first peaches,
sunshine soaked and siren sweet,
seduce all senses.
— Geo Davis

First Peach, 2021 (Source: Geo Davis)

Peach Plenitude

Growing up in the Adirondacks’ Champlain Valley, we grew fruit trees. Apples, pears, quince. But never peaches. I honestly think it was considered foolhardy in those days. Perhaps conditions pre/post climate change have shifted enough or the varietals have become hardy enough that we can account for the difference in perspective this way. Or maybe it was just unfamiliarity.

First Peaches, 2021 (Source: Geo Davis)

For this reason, I’m abundantly grateful for our stone fruit harvests in general and our peaches in particular. It’s almost as if we’re cheating nature! And my tendency to romance the first peaches of the season is rooted in this enduring awe. We actually raised peaches! Almost too good to be true. Perhaps this peach plenitude will eventually become familiar enough that we’ll take it for granted. But it’s hard to imagine. Such a delicate ambrosial fruit prospering in our northern climes. Truly a bonanza!

First Peach, 2021 (Source: Geo Davis)

If you’re new to my blathering blog, welcome. And you might be curious what sort of peaches we’re growing. Our proximity to Lake Champlain creates a microclimate that favors us when it comes to stone fruit and other marginal crops for our northern growing zone. On the other hand our soil, especially west of the carriage barn where the orchard is located, has an extremely high clay content. This is not ideal for growing peaches. They do not favor wet feet.

That said, we’ve been fortunate growing Reliance Peach (2 trees) and Contender Peach (2 trees). I’d welcome a recommendation from growers who think we’d be wise to add another winter-hardy variety that responds well to holistic orcharding.

August 5, 2021
Peaches This Year

Peaches This Year, August 2022 (Source: Geo Davis)

Glorious indeed it is to report that our peaches this year are the tastiest I’ve ever grown. Also the biggest, juiciest, sweetest, and IMHO the prettiest.

O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay! — Lewis Carroll

I’m chortling in my joy. Imagine, if you dare, the decadence of lifting a sun warmed peach, freshly plucked from the branch, up to your mouth, lips parting against the fuzzy flesh, teeth sinking effortlessly into the sweet meat, juice dribbling down your chin,…

It’s truly sensational! Peach perfection. Almost.

Sadly our perfect peaches this year belie a bittersweet backstory. But let’s micropoetry-pause a moment before sharing the slightly sadder side of this decadent moment.

Peaches This Year, August 2022 (Source: Geo Davis)

Peaches This Year: A Haiku

Few peaches this year
but plump, nectar swollen with
best flavor ever.
— Geo Davis

Bittersweet Backstory

That haiku actually tells the whole story, backstory and all. Our peaches this year are startlingly few after the bumper crops we’ve enjoyed over the last few years. It’s fair to say that 2020 and 2021 provided enough peaches to satisfy our most gluttonous appetites and to share with all who desired, from friends to wildlife. But 2022 has been a been a poignant recalibration.

We lost our two Reliance Peach trees this season. All of four peach trees budded on time this spring, and all four began to push out tiny little leaves. But then the two Reliance trees stalled. No apparent weather shock or fungus or predation. Just withering. And then suddenly the Reliance trees were dead. The other two trees, both Contender Peach variety, struggled as well. But they gradually overcame whatever was afflicting them (despite never really recovering 100%). Both Contender Peach trees experienced some die-back, and both set an unusually light load of fruit.

We will be replacing the dead Reliance trees and likely adding in a third new peach tree as well. Any suggestions? (Reliance vs. Contender Peach) I’m definitely open to recommendations for hardy, tasty peach tree recommendations that respond well to holistic orcharding (i.e. don’t rely on pesticide.) I’ll enjoy researching replacements, so that’s a silver lining, I suppose. But the best upside to the paucity of peaches this year has been is that the few we’ve enjoyed are quite miraculously the tastiest we’ve ever grown!

August 26, 2022
Orchard Update: Apricots & Peaches
An early and mostly temperate spring has given us a jump start in Rosslyn’s gardens and meadows. The new orchard behind the carriage barn, already planted with plum trees and pear trees, has almost doubled in size over the last couple of weeks with the addition of apricots and peaches.

Doug Decker, our carpenter-turned-jack-of-all-trades-handyman who diligently caretakes Rosslyn, has planted eight new trees in the orchard, and last week’s rain, rain, rain will help the young trees overcome transplant shock. The new additions include two each of the following:
- Peach Reliance
- Peach Contender
- Apricot Sugar
- Apricot Harlayne
Despite the fact that many people opt for dwarf trees nowadays, all the the trees in our orchard will grow to full size. Full sized trees tend to be more cold hardy than the dwarfs, they don’t require lifelong staking to stabilize the trunks and they place the fruit high enough that the deer pose less of a threat.

In the image above, Doug heads out of the barn — cell phone to ear, cruising on the John Deere Gator — to plant the newly arrived fruit trees. Susan jokes that the reason many of the fellows like to work for us is that they can ride around in the Gator. She may be right. I’ll look for some fun photos to pass along. And I promise to post some orchard shots too!

Although the fruit trees in the new orchard have been our fruit tree focus over the last year, I continue to prune and restore the old apple trees. And last fall we planted some new apple trees too. More apple trees will be planted later this spring and fall.
April 28, 2012