PEACH (OF, pesche, Fr. It. pcsea, persica, from Lat. persieton, from Gk. TrepaacOv, persileon, peach, neu. sg. of TIreaneie, Persikos, Persian, from Ilepaie, Perris, 'OPers. Parse, Per sia: so called because the first peaches known to the Greeks came from Persia). A deciduous orchard fruit believed to have originated in China. where it has been cultivated from very remote times. It was early introduced into Europe by way of Persia, hence its specific name, Prunus Persica (order Rosacete). The peach is a small, much branched tree. 15 to 20 fret high, with lanecolate leaves, triplicate buds usually at each node, the two outer of which are flower buds and the middle one a leaf bud, and flowers which usually blossom before the leaves ap pear. The fruit is a drupe. varying much in size and color of flesh and downy skin. Peaches have been variously classified. Popularly they are separated into two groups—clingstones and freestones. These two classes gradually merge into each other in the different varieties, and even the same variety may be a clingstone or a freestone in different seasons. Price has classified the nearly 300 varieties of peaches grown in North America into the following five races: (1) Peen-To, a flat, medium-sized, greenish white. very early peach, suited for commercial culture only in Florida and some of the Gulf States. (2) South China race. Rather small, oval, somewhat flattened fruit, with an extended re curved apex. (3) Spanish or Indian race. Fruit late, nearly always yellow, with a hairy down. (4) North China race, Fruit large, oval, with slightly recurved beak. (5) The Persian race, which includes the great majority of large, yel low or white fleshed varieties grown in the North ern United States. Certain smooth-skinned peaches are popularly called nectarines. They may originate as seedlings or bud variations (`sports'), and may be propagated and cultivated like other varieties of the peach.
In America peaches are grown in orchards like apples; in England and Middle Europe they are usually trained against walls, or other protection, cultivated in pots and under glass. The tree is hardy, withstanding a winter tem perature of —12° to —18° F. Should a few warm days occur in winter and the fruit buds start into growth, they may be easily killed at a much higher temperature. The chief difficulty in peach-growing arises from the danger from Into spring frosts. The peach, like the almond, blossoms early unless held in cheek by cool spring weather or some artificial means; hence, there is often more difficulty in growing peaches 4 in the South than in the North. These facts tend to confine the commercial culture of peaches • to particular localities. In America the peach regions include certain more or less continuous areas from Connecticut to Georgia, the eastern and southern shores of the Great Lakes, much of southern Illinois, parts of Missouri, Kansas, and eastern Texas, and nearly the whole of Cali fornia. Of these different peach areas the most widely known are those located in Maryland, Delaware, Georgia, and Michigan.
Peaches are propagated from seed, which is usually stratified with moist sand in the fall, and left exposed to the freezing and thawing of win ter, which softens and cracks the pits. In spring
the pits are planted 6 to 8 inches apart in rows wide enough to admit of horse cultivation. and the following August or September the seedlings are budded with improved varieties, since the peach does not, except in a few instances, repro duce true to seed. (see BUDDING.) In the South ern States the seedlings are often budded in June, and the budded trees are set in the orchard in the fall or following spring. In the North trees budded one fall are allowed to grow the following season before transplanting to the permanent orchard. Peaches thrive best on light, sandy, gravelly, or shaly soils, though larger trees are grown on heavier soils. High or rolling lands are desirable to insure good soil and air drainage, for the peach must be plavted in protected localities free from late spring frosts. Early blooming is sometimes delayed by planting on northern or northeastern slopes. Thoroughly whitewashing the trees in fall or winter also has a tendency to delay blossoming. The trees are usually set in the orchard about 20 feet apart each way, though whete careful attention is given to pruning and fertilizing, as in some commercial orchards, they may be set as close as 15 feet apart each way. The peach is not a long-lived tree, even under the most favorable conditions, seldom ex ceeding thirty years. The life of a commercial orchard is seldom more than seven to nine years. The trees come into bearing about the third year after setting in the orchard. The best peach-growers advocate clean cultivation in the orchard up to about the middle of summer, when a cover crop is sown and cultivation stopped. Trees thus treated ripen up their wood better and are less likely to winter-kill than if cultivated longer in the season. Potash and phosphatic fer tilizers are most in demand in the peach orchard. By planting leguminous cover crops and turning these under each spring other nitrogenous ferti lizers will seldom be required. Barnyard manure is not considered desirable in the peach or chard unless the land is very poor. It affects the quality of the fruit unfavorably and is likely to produce a rank unripened growth of wood.
Commercial peach-growers quite generally thin their peaches to stand 5 or 6 inches apart after the usual 'June drop' occurs. Peaches are borne only on wood of the preceding season's growth; hence by carefully heading hack this new growth each spring they are really thinned in part at the same time. In heading in it is customary to re move about one-half of the new wood growth of the previous season. in harvesting, the fruits are gathered when full grown and well colored, but before they begin to soften, graded according to size, and marketed in various forms of small packages. Besides being extensively used as a dessert fruit, peaches are canned in enormous quantities, evaporated, and sold as dried peaches, and also used to some extent in the manufacture of peach brandy.