Lodi apples have been and are grown by many nurseries. For instance, Van Well Nursery of Washington State sells Lodi apple. What is exclusive is STARK Lodi, like they have some special strain of Lodi apple. I have an exclusive apple that is called Geraldo's Lodi. It is an exclusive and no has or can provide you with Geraldo's Lodi, but Geraldo. If you want Geraldo's Lodi you have to buy it from me. I also have Exclusive Geraldo's Heavy Duty Tilton Apricot and Exclusive Geraldo's Deluxe and Super Italian prune. You can't get those from anyone but Geraldo. Of course you can get Tiltons and Italian prunes from someone else, but they won't be Exclusive Geraldos. Don't you see how crazy that is? Starks went bankrupt in the early 1980s and were then bought by someone. They have not had continual ownership over the years. In the early 1980s they started selling an extra early Fuji. I know a man who bought enough of the trees to plant, I think it was, 160 acres. A few years later the Pac NW Fruit Tester's Association looked at the apple and said,"That is nothing more than Senshu, an old Japanese apple that has long been discarded as inferior and not worth planting". What had happened was that a man in Oregon found an "early Fuji" and contacted Stark Bros. They bought wood from him and propagated it and started purveying an extra early Fuji. An important thing to note is that reportedly Stark Bros never sent anyone out to Oregon to look at that fruit on the tree. They had so many lawsuits they took bankruptcy. Starkspur Montmorency. I am sure this is a fine tree, but do you know how many mutants these trees produce? It isn't that hard to find spur varieties and redder and bigger and blah, blah, blah. the most famous one I can think of is Granspur Granny Smith. It was going to be a hot variety, until we found out it didn't produce. Do you think the new strains of Fuji eat better than the old standard Fuji? No, of course not, but the old standard Fuji wasn't patented. And it wasn't red, which is what almost all Americans want. Red Fuji, Red Gala, Red Jonagold and now, heaven help us, a Red Granny Smith. rant mode: off

campv: Stark's have a dwarf 'Hardy Giant' Asian pear dwarf supreme that they list as disease resistant. They say their other varieties of Asian pears are not disease resistant. Do you remember the name of the Asian pear that you have there? The pics of the 'Hardy Giant' show quite large pears but I'd expect them to be smaller here for us. fruitnut: I wonder if Stark's 'Hardy Giant'is similar to your Korean Giant or Olympic? I'd prefer firm/crunchy as opposed to juicy also!

I would agree w/ Hman's comment. Not that I'm trying to bash Stark's, but there are plenty of quality nurseries which give rootstock info. That said, I'm really getting disappointed with Adams. Out of about 150 peach trees I ordered from them in 2012, I've identified 4 trees as being mislabeled. These are trees I've positively identified as mislabeled through bloom or fruit set. In some cases I ordered multiple trees of the same variety and (for example) all the trees had a showy bloom but one (clearly mislabeled). I expect I'll discover more mislabeled trees in the future. In one instance I ordered a flat peach (Galaxy) but the fruit is of a regular peach (pretty easy to tell the difference). I understand mistakes happen, but this is too often to be unintentional unless they have very sloppy procedures. I've talked to one other grower who has seen the same thing (i.e peaches supposed to ripen in a certain window, but ripen much earlier or later - clearly not what he ordered). Will I still order from Adams? Probably, because they always seem to have some unique offerings. But I'll be watching closely to see if what I ordered is actually what I receive.

I am not excited about the Stark Brother's acquistion of Miller Nursery. I have before me a $119.28 from Starks I ordered in 2011. Not a single tree or plant I ordered is alive today. I ordered Harglow Apricot Standard. Earliblue Plum, Stanley Prune Plum Stark Beach Plum. Heritage Red Raspberry, And Himbo top Primocane Red Raspberry. And over the years I have ordered many trees ( I am guessing between 25 and 40 trees) from Starks. the only one that is living. Yes one is a Pecan that I planted in the Mid 70's. All the English Walnuts I ordered maybe 8 plants over the years not one survived. Wait a minute... I may have one peach that has survived and maybe one sweet cherry. I am now a week shy of 64 years oild. I was a fool to place my last order with Starks. Oh my God they took me!! And my life is at the short end. Three apple trees I order from Miller's are living. Now that I've read the above blogage. I fear I may have gotten varietiies other that I ordered. But what does Starks do. put something in the plants that make them die in a year and a half? I know I ordered three Hazel nut bushes two years ago from Miller's Not one made it. They replaced it. And I took photos of the roots before I planted them If anyone would like to see. And let me look maybe one is alive. Yes..... The Fingerlakes S.H. Filbert sent up some shoots. The Barcelona came was a five foot cane with a few scraggly roots and another variety that had better roots died again. I did make sure to cut the long cane off. But to no avail. The two English Walnuts I ordered from Miller's are alive I believe. I am apprehensive though as to the quailty lineage. I have an aquantance who planted a whole orchard of English walnuts. Adding phosphate rock and lime etc. to the soil to find thirty years later trees that are small and deformed and produce notthing. It seems that what they are selling is hope. And for many the hope is.... Couertillar