THE PEACHES OF NEW YORK 269 



branchlets slender, long, with long intemodes, green mottled with brownish-red, smooth, 

 glabrous, with numerous inconspicuous, small lenticels. 



Leaves sis inches long, one and five-eighths inches wide, folded upward and slightly 

 recurled, oval to ovate-lanceolate, thin, leathe^^•; upper surface dark green but often 

 with a lighter tinge, smooth; lower surface graynsh-green ; apex acuminate; margin 

 shaUowly crenate; petiole one-half inch long, thick, with two to eight large, reniform 

 glands variable in position. 



Fruit matures in early mid-season; variable in size, the larger specimens varying 

 from three to three and one-half inches in diameter, round-oblate, compressed, with 

 unequal halves, often btdged near the apex; ca\nt3- wide, deep, flaring; suture shallow, 

 becoming deeper near the tip; apex variable, often with a mucronate tip; color lemon- 

 yellow changing to orange-yellow, blushed with deep, dark red, mottled; pubescence 

 heavy; skin thick, tough, separates from the pulp; flesh yellow, stained with red near the 

 pit, very juicy, tender and melting, sweet, highly flavored, sprightly; very good in quality; 

 stone free, one and three-eighths inches long, more than one inch wide, oval, plump, flat- 

 tened near the base, with roughened svirface marked by large, deep pits and^hort grooves; 

 ventral suture deeply furrowed along the edges, rather wide; dorsal suture grooved 

 deeph'. wide. 



ST. JOHN 



I. Mich. Hort. Soc. Rpt. 320. 1890. 2. Am. Pom. Soc. Cat. 46. 1891. 3. Mich. Hort. Soc. Rpt. 

 68. 1891. 4. Tex. Sta. Bui. 39:814. 1896. 5. Ont. Fr. Exp. Sla. Rpt. 9:8 fig. 1902. 6. Waugh 

 Am. Peach Orch. 207. 1913. 



Plater's St. John. 7. Downing Fr. Trees Am. 613. 1869. 



YeUoTiB St. John. 8. Am. Pom. Soc. Cat. 18. 1871. 9. Am. Pom. Soc. Rpt. 64. 1871. 10. Ohio 

 Sla. Bttl. 170:182. 1906. 



Fteitas St. John. Ii. Pa. Bd. Agr. Rpt. 586. 1878. 12. Ca. Sla. Bui. 42:235. 1898. 



May Beauty. 13. Am. Pom. Soc. Rpt. 148. 1883. 



Crane. 14. Mich. Sta. Sp. Bui. 44:34. 1910. 



Unproductiveness and uncertainty in bearing keep this magnificent 

 yellow-fleshed dessert fruit from being one of the most popular early 

 peaches. Even with these handicaps, to which may be added small size 

 in many situations, St. John has maintained great popularity for home 

 orchards and in many peach-regions is grown for the markets. It is one 

 of the earliest of the Crawford-like peaches, a perfect freestone, handsome 

 in appearance, sweet, rich and delicious in flavor and pleasing in all of the 

 flesh attributes of a good dessert peach. St. John resembles Early Craw- 

 ford in size and shape but is a little more rotimd, runs somewhat smaller, 

 is not quite as high in quality and ripens several days earlier. The trees 

 are all that could be asked for in size, vigor and hardiness, falling short 

 only in the characters noted in the opening sentence. St. John should 

 always be planted in the home orchard and it would seem that it is more 

 often worth planting in commercial orchards. The color-plate does not 



