Steve:

Thanks for the report! Mine were a lot more colored up than that last yr when ripe. Maybe I harvested too late. But most other cherries or plums get better not worse until they shrivel or turn to mush.

My ST were 20 grams and 24 brix. Flavor was OK maybe even good but way below Flavor Supreme. Very forgettable fruit IMO. I cut the tree down partly because like Bella Gold peacotum, it was virus infected in first leaf. Where's that coming from, DWN?

My Dapple Supreme both fell off so I ate them. Both 21.5 brix and 50-60 grams with very good flavor but still way way below FS.

I couldn't get more than a couple fruits on Bella Gold either. Hand pollination is much more productive on FS.

Bella Gold fruit is average at best. I'll not be buying another.

I think Dapple Supreme will be useful because of it's harvest window. Haven't found anything really good between FS and Flavor King/Grenade other than Geo Pride. GP can be very good but still no in FS territory.

Emerald Drop to me is a little better than Flavor Queen and they look about the same.

Splash is more like a good plum than a good pluot, ie nothing special.

I've got a 3n1 tree with splash, emerald drop and geo pride. This is the first year I'm going to get a crop from it, I haven't tasted any of them yet,
That's disappointing about Splash because they look so good on the tree. Right now they are bright yellow and stating to get a orange/red blush
Geo pride's are just staring to turn purple and Emerald drop doesn't look anywhere near ripe.
Deer got into my orchard in early spring and trashed my Flavor queen and Flavor grenade. The tree have recovered fine, but no fruit this year.
It was a really weird/warm winter here. I don't really know how chill hours work but I got no fruit at all on Flavor King, only a couple Dapple Dandy and Flavor finale. My Flavorich which supposedly need 800 chill hrs is just loaded with fruit

From what I have read it depends on how much cherry is mixed in. If there is a lot of cherry it will have a small pit like a cherry. What size is the pit?

Sweet treat's parentage (patented as pixie sweet 2) is:

Seed parent: cherry x [(plum) x (plum x apricot)]

Pollen parent: plum x [((peach x plum) x peach)*].

*tri-lite peachplum is one of the grandparents: (peach x plum) x peach.

Thus, sweet treat's parentage is: 50%, 25% cherry, 18.75 % peach, 6.25% apricot.

^ 50% plum.

FN,

When you cut down the ST Pluerry, did you re-use the rootstock or pulled it? I usually topworked the tree that was bad to a different varieties.

Tony

Tony:

I'm trying to clean out virus issues in the stone fruit so all old and infected trees are getting the boot. Not sure how I got it since I've never swapped cuttings. Well I picked up a couple varieties in CA but that was 2002.

If it's spreading in my greenhouse it would have to be aphids or root grafts. I've got one tree left that I brought to TX from CA that doesn't appear infected and it's going soon.

I'm hoping the new trees stay clean for at least a couple yrs indicating I cleaned things up. The trees still produced good fruit. In 2012 I had things tested for plum pox virus and it thankfully came back negative.

fruitnut,
What did the symptoms look like that affected the Bella Gold Peacotum?I have one and the leaves are sort of a mottled yellow green.I hope that's not it. Brady

Yes mottled yellow and curled under. If just yellow probably not what I had. As I remember it was like that from yr one. But it might have gotten it here.

I think Patty S. posted that her Peacotum had unusual leaves the first year and looked better the second year.Maybe the discoloration is unique to this variety. Brady
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I was planning on doing a big buy of hybrids this January, but I picked up a Flavor Grenade and Bella Gold on clearance, potted this year. And I have been offered the last pluerry at a nursery that was potted LAST year. I love cherries and plums so i'm definitely going to buy one in January, unless I take the two year old tree.
The burgandy I have is TEENY. So, to those of you who have pluerry, do you think I should wait for a small tree in january? Or take the 2 year old potted pluerry?

Also, pluerries were at the farmers market I went to this week in L.A. Are all of the pluerries sweet treat aka pixie sweet 2? Or is there a pixie sweet 1? Or other varieties of plum x cherry?

I had no idea until I read this post that pixie sweet and sweet treat were the same thing. Can anyone confirm?

It does look like Bella Gold Peacotum and Bella Gold Colorcot are the same thing, from looking at the DWN website.

babyg:

There are hundreds of all types of hybrids in CA. Many times what we can buy retail. The breeders and big growers test and grow hundreds of these things. Plus there are now many small operations crossing the various stone fruits many with material they brought back from other parts of the world.

It's really hard to tell what's what.

Quting Babyg:

"Also, pluerries were at the farmers market I went to this week in L.A. Are all of the pluerries sweet treat aka pixie sweet 2? Or is there a pixie sweet 1? Or other varieties of plum x cherry?"

The ones sold at the Farmers market are sweet pixie (United States Patent PP23211). They are a cherry x (plum x cherry) cross; they are also marketed as verry cherry plums.

Here is an interesting article:

"Market Watch: Plum-cherry hybrids find a sweet spot
June 30, 2012:By David Karp : Special to the Los Angeles Times"
http://articles.latimes.com/2012/jun/30/food/la-fo-marketwatch-online-20120706

"I had no idea until I read this post that pixie sweet and sweet treat were the same thing. Can anyone confirm?"

Yup, they are the same fruit. In fact, Craig from Dave Wilson Nursery stated on the forums that sweet treat pluerry is patented as "sweet pixie 2"; (United States Patent PP23796).

Quoting Bardy:

I think Patty S. posted that her Peacotum had unusual leaves the first year and looked better the second year.Maybe the discoloration is unique to this variety.

My two peacotums had unusual leaf discoloration last year, too; but this year, it went away.

I actually really liked the pluerries, and we had a ton this year. Second year in the ground, first year fruiting. I probably left too many on, but they turned out great. Everyone that tried them loved them. I am in sf bay area, so maybe the tree just does really well here.

I just finished my small pluerry harvest. The tree is in its 2nd year and while it bloomed a lot it only set a half dozen fruits. Thats not so bad compared to your average pluot here, I got only two Flavor Supremes on my 10-year tree. The fruits are sweet and are very crunchy. Thats the best part, the flavor I found cloying, it took me back to the dime store candy I ate as a kid. Note that Flavor Grenade comes out similarly for me. Still, I'll give it a year or two more to see if it gets any better. I had no rot at all on it which is unusual compared to pluots.

Scott

Scott,

Glad to hear that you are not going to pull it. Hopefully, mine will fruit next year and I will have the chance to taste it.

Tony

I thought they benefited a lot from ripening off the tree for almost a week. But I bought them at a farmer's market.