There is no question nor debate, if you are in an area where Moorpark apricots will grow and produce, then you must grow Moorpark. I grew up in Sunnyvale California in what had been a Moorpark apricot orchard. The housing developer left a tree or two in each backyard. You will not find a larger, sweeter, juicier, tangier apricot than a Moorpark. It's perfect for canning, drying, and freezing. It makes unbelievably delicious jam and cobbler -- just don't ruin the jam or cobbler with peaches or pineapple -- no need to gild the lily -- you can't improve on perfection. The Moorpark has one and only one drawback -- it can't be stored for later consumption. Thus, it can't be shipped. However, apricots that can be stored and shipped are not worth eating; they are dry and bland.

@Diyfreddy -Pluots/plumcots Emerald Drop, Splash, and Geo Pride are doing great as separate trees and fruit every year. I had them first grafted on one tree and only Geo Pride survived and grew to a full tree. Flavor Grenade tastes wonderful but struggles with disease. Minnie Royal and Royal Lee cherry trees also have lovely blossems and fruit that the birds love. You would have to net the trees to get any cherries but they're good. I'm elderly and don't prune my fruit trees anymore so that might influence their production. Citrus do so well without fuss, spraying or pruning that I'm enjoying them so much more than the stone fruits. Some varieties of bananas do well here now with the climate change.

Fruitnut, I wrote a response to your last question on underwatered nectarines, but I guess it didn't get through the system. I'm familiar with the underwatering symptoms you have specified. I've had that problem, too. But I'm talking about fruit which looks damaged even before the blossoms wither. The thread which discusses thrips is linked below. I think you're right about overwatering. But after cherry season, I think the best commercial stone fruits in our area are the new supersweet nectarines, until later in the season when there are a few good varieties of commercial plums. Update on CWB, Peachcot, etc: This year, I got normal bloom on my Canadian White Blenheim. I think our area doesn't get enough chill some years. But I still had delayed foliation on Stark Sweetheart. So I guess CWB doesn't have the highest chill requirement in the world. I also had some other varieties with some bloom during CWB's late bloom season. But the rain during bloom seemed to decimate the crop. I didn't get any Harcot fruit this year. I thought I had a few young fruits, but next time I looked, there was nothing. Not even fallen fruits. It's always been a reliable variety for me before. Don't know if it was blossom blight or our freak wind storms this year. Or maybe our Garden Partner ate them. It's also odd that I got a decent crop of Blenheim during the same rainy bloom season. It's notorious for blossom blight. Maybe it's just luck - the days when bloom is heaviest vs. days when it rains. I only got 3 or 4 CWB fruits on 2 trees. I ate the first one today. It had fallen off the tree. It was much sweeter than Blenheim, with a rich flavor different from the typical apricot. Refreshing rather than "sprightly", though it still had a touch of acid. I think that this is the first one I've tasted which didn't get too much water while ripening. The texture was soft, but pleasant. The color is a creamy yellow-orange - not really close to white. No red blush. I would recommend CWB for areas with just a little more winter chill than ours. It needs a pollenizer which blooms late. It's a sweet pit variety. We've also been getting fruit from a tree which is either a Peachcot or a Golden Amber. The Golden Amber near the house has died. It never did well in its location. I bought the tree I now have as a Peachcot, but later learned that this was about the time the USDA mislabeled Peachcot scions which went to wholesaler LE Cooke in a virus elimination program. The next year, trees they sold as Peachcots were really Golden Amber. If you have one of their Peachcots which is older than 10 years old, you probably have their original strain. Peachcot trees sold after the error was corrected are probably a USDA stock variety, as far as I know. There's a nursery in Texas which sells an August-fruiting Peachcot with a low chill requirement. That idea always intrigued me. Anyway, I am not quite sure if I have a Peachcot now or a Golden Amber. Both my defunct Golden Amber and the alleged Peachcot bloom over a long season. Fruiting is more prolonged than with most other apricots. Last year, I was pretty confident my "Peachcot" was Golden Amber. But this year, the flavor of the ripe fruit makes me think it might be a Peachcot, after all. The very ripe fruits are quite large, very sweet and very soft, but with a melting quality rather than a grainy or mushy quality like, say, Royalty. And it may be my imagination, but I thought I tasted some peach with the apricot. Very nice. The tree is susceptible to premature fruit drop. It's not growing in the best soil. Though it has prolonged bloom, I don't recall any signs of delayed foliation here, so it's probably suitable for areas with moderately low chill. The fruits on my little volunteer apricot tree are almost ripe. I think I did fairly well in the volunteer fruit lottery. When almost ripe, the fruit is small, highly colored with a red blush, firm - crispy to rubbery, sweet and quite tasty. Freestone. Fuzz is very scant and some of the fruits got sun damage - ugly brown patches on the sun-exposed side. I think it may the the offspring of a commercial variety. The tree is brushy with lots of short branches off the main branches which resemble long thorns, though they're not really sharp. Branches are lax. Just one example of what you can get from planting an apricot seed. I'm getting my first Santa Rosa plums. A ripe Santa Rosa really lets you know you're alive. Sweet and sour with a variety of intense flavors coming from each layer inside the fruit. The Weeping Santa Rosa is sweeter with very nice flavor, but eating a regular Santa Rosa is still a unique experience which I really like. We have too many, though. Time to call my husband's sister, who makes jam. Here is a link that might be useful: nectarines and thrips

Hi all I live in California and new to this forum,I love all stone fruit my favorite is apricots- I tasted some new ones this year.I have tried Angelcots for a couple years in a row now and they don't seem to be getting any better to me , the ones I ate seemed to lack flavor and have a tartness to them.I tried a new one called Red Blush it was small and it too was disappointing in taste.I tried one that was named California it was huge the size of a large peach,as I bit into it ,I was surprised to its good taste and sweetness. I thought wow that's a good apricot and then I tried Candycots OMG folks they are to drool for ,they say that the brown spotting isn't scabbing its because they have so much sugar it shows on the skin .they taste so good the name fits.thats some of the new one ive tried this year.the fruit in the picture left to right is California,Red Blush and Candycots