l88 THE PEACHES OF NEW YORK 



narrow, abrupt, usually white; suture shallow; apex round, with a mucronatc tip; color dull 

 greenish-white, entirely overspread with dingy pink mingled with splashes and stripes 

 of darker, clouded red, mottled; pubescence long, coarse; skin tough, adherent to the pulp; 

 flesh red, becoming lighter colored next the stone, juicy, coarse, string}', tough and meaty, 

 brisk, pleasantly flavored; fair in quality; stone clinging, one and one-fourth inches long, 

 seven-eighths inch wide, oval to slightly obovate, short-pointed, strongly bulged near the 

 apex, with grooved and pitted surfaces; ventral suture deeply furrowed at the sides, 

 narrow; dorsal suture deep, medium in width. 



BLOOD LEAF 



I. Mich. Sta. Bui. 118:33. •895- 



Blood-leaved Peach. 2. Card. Mon. 13:206. 1871. 3. Ibid. 14:316, PI. 1872. 4. Ibid. 15:142, 

 183. 1873. s. Horticulturist 28:155. i873- 6. Card. Mow. 17:58, 59. 1875. 



Blood Leaf is a handsome ornamental. Its beet-red leaves in early 

 spring and its pink blossoms, borne in great profusion, entitle it to esteem 

 for both foliage and flowers. It is vi^orth growing as well for its fruits. 

 The color-plate opposite page 78 shows the flowers and the accompanying 

 illustration depicts the fruit-characters. The peaches are in no way 

 remarkable and yet they please some as a dessert fruit. Seedlings springing 

 up under two trees of this variety in the Station orchard in 19 13, furnished 

 interesting data on the inheritance of the blood-red color in the leaves; 

 of this peach. Out of 252 young trees, 189 were red-leaved and 63 green- 

 leaved — an exact three-to-one ratio to show that the green color is carried 

 as a recessive. 



Several stories are told of the origin of this peach. One is that on 

 the battlefield of Fort Donelson, Kentucky, a southern general, fatally 

 wounded, sucked the juice of a peach and threw the stone into the little 

 pool of blood which flowed from his side. From this pit in its bloody 

 seed-bed sprang the tree with its blood-red leaves. John L. Hebron, in 

 a letter published in Gardener's Monthly, 1873, tells a different tale. 

 According to Hebron the variety was found by P. I. Connor in 1866 at 

 Champion Hills, Mississippi, on the battlefield where General Tilghman 

 was killed, a tree having sprung up close to the spot where the General 

 died. The variety is sometimes called the General Tilghman peach. Leav- 

 ing fable and coming to facts, we find that the variety originated in 

 Mississippi in the sixties and was introduced to the trade in 1871. 



Tree large, vigorous, upright-spreading, willowy in growth, open-topped, hardy, 

 unproductive; trunk thick, rough; branches smooth, reddish -bronze overspread with light 

 ash-gray; branchlets slender, long, with short intemodes, dull green overlaid with dark 

 red, smooth, glabrous, w\th numerous small, inconspicuovis lenticels. 



