THE PEACHES OF NEW YORK 219 



Tree large, vigorous, upright-spreading, hardy, unproductive; trunk thick; branches 

 stocks', smooth, reddish-brown covered with light ash-gray; branchlets dark red, with 

 faint traces of green, glossy, smooth, glabrous, with numerous conspicuous, small lenticels. 



Leaves seven inches long, one and five-eighths inches wide, folded upward and recurved, 

 oval to ob'ovate-lanceolate, rather thick, leathery; upper surface dark green, smooth except 

 near the midrib; lower surface gra^ash-green ; margin sharply serrate, red; petiole three- 

 eighths inch long, glandless or ■n-ith one to three small, globose, reddish-bro\\Ta glands 

 usually at the base of the blade. 



Flower-buds short, obtuse, plump, heavily pubescent, appressed; blossoms appear 

 in mid-season; flowers pale pink, with white centers and edged with darker pink, nearly 

 one inch across; pedicels nearly sessile; caljoc-tube reddish-green, light yellow within, cam- 

 panulate, glabrous; calyx-lobes medium in length and width, obtuse or acute, glabrous 

 within, pubescent without; petals roundish-oval, tapering to claws red at the base; 

 filaments one-fourth inch long, equal to the petals in length; pistil longer than the 

 stamens. 



Fruit matures in mid-season; two and five-sixteenths inches long, two and seven- 

 sixteenths inches wide, roundish-oblate, bulged near the apex, oblique, with imequal sides; 

 cavity slightly contracted, deep, wide, abrupt, with tender skin; suture shallow, becoming 

 deeper at both apex and cavity and faintly showing beyond the tip; apex roundish, with 

 a mucronate tip; color greenish-white changing to creamy-white, with a pink blush and 

 sometimes with faint mottUngs of red; pubescence short, thick, fine; skin thin, tou^h, 

 variable in adherence to the pulp; flesh whitish, deeply tinged with red near the pit, juicy, 

 string\', tender, mild, pleasantly flavored; good in quality; stone semi-free to free, one and 

 one-eighth inches long, three-fotuths inch thick, roundish-oval, very plimip, flattened at 

 the base, tapering to a short, roimded point, with grooved surfaces; ventral sutm-e winged, 

 rather narrow; dorsal suture grooved. 



GOLD DROP 



1. Kan. Hort. Soc. Peach, The 142. 1899. 2. Mich. Sta. Bui. 169:214. 1899. 3. Budd-Hansen 

 Am. Hort. Man. 2:347. 1903. 4. Am. Pom. Soc. Cat. 37. 1909. 



Golden Drop. 5. U. S. Pat. Off. Rpt. 298. 1855. 6. Mich. Hort. Soc. Rpt. 243. 1886. 7. Onl. 

 Fr.Exp.Sta.Rpt.2:$sng. 1895. 8. AftcA. 5to. 5^. 5«/. 44:42, 43 fig., 44, 45. 1910. 



Gold Drop, long a familiar variety in Michigan peach-orchards, is 

 not much grown elsewhere. It is doubtfully worth planting in New York 

 as a peach of commerce but should find a place in every home orchard. 

 The variety has several distinctive pectaliarities which make it a pleasing 

 variation in the peach-orchard and add to its merits as a home fruit. 

 Thus, its transparent, golden skin and fiesh make it one of the handsomest 

 of all peaches; add to handsome appearance a somewhat distinctive 

 flavor — vinous, rich, refreshing — and the peach becomes one that all 

 agree is verj- good and one that, were the size larger, would sell in- any 

 market. Gold Drop is ftirther characterized by great hardiness in tree 



