THE NATIONAL NURSERYMAN. 
7 i 
CHINESE CLING GROUP . 
Interesting Bulletin on Peaches by G. Harold Powell, Late of the 
Delaware Experiment Station and N owAssistant U. S. Pomolo- 
gist—Characteristics of this Group—Prolific Annual Bear¬ 
ing, Large and Beautiful Fruit, Wide Cultural Range • 
G. Harold Powell, who resigned as horticulturist of the Dela¬ 
ware Experiment Station September 1 , 1901 , to become assist¬ 
ant pomologist, U. S. Department of Agriculture, prepared a 
Delaware station bulletin which has been issued, on “ The 
Chinese Cling Group of Peaches.” In his summary of the 
contents of this bulletin Mr. Powell says: 
The Chinese Cling Group of peaches contains about sixty varieties. 
The group is approximately sixty years old in America. 
The group is mainly characterized by broad headed, vigorous, hardy 
and prolific, spreading trees; large, flat, deep green foliage; flowers 
very large in the pure type, but small in 
the mixed descendants ; fruit large, 
variable in color; skin usually rather 
delicate; flesh peculiarly fine grained, 
juicy; stone cling, semi-cling or free; 
season, throughout the season of peach 
ripening. 
The group is further characterized 
commercially by the prolific annual 
bearing of the best varieties, the beauty 
and large size of the fruit, and its wide 
cultural range. Its chief drawback is 
the susceptibility to rot of many of the 
varieties, though the early kinds are less 
susceptible than varieties of the Hale 
and Alexander type. 
The group is cultivated commercial! v 
from Texas to Connecticut, and in peach 
sections east of the Pacific peach belt. 
The group had its origin around 
Shanghai, China. It has been known as 
the “Northern Chinese Race,” but the 
“Chinese Cling Group” should replace 
the former name. 
The varieties mostly grown are 
Greensboro, Carman, Thurber, Georgia 
(Belle), and Elberta. 
GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS. 
Mr. Powell makes these observa¬ 
tions on the general characteristics 
of the group: 
“The Chinese Cling Group of 
peaches has grown up in the 
United States within the last half century. It has been 
assumed that the ancestors of the group had their origin in the 
Northern Provinces of China, and the varieties descending 
from them have been designated in recent years as the North¬ 
ern Chinese Race. At the present time the group contains but 
fifty catalogued varieties, the most important of which is the 
Elberta. The varieties are a heterogeneous lot, some showing 
the important characteristics of the Chinese Cling, while in 
others one may recognize a blending of the Old Mixon, the 
Crawford, or of some other distinct type of peach. The group, 
as a unit, is strongly characterized in fruit and tree, the lead¬ 
ing features of which may be summarized as follows : 1 rees 
broad-headed, open, spreading, or even drooping, usually very 
vigorous, hardy and prolific ; foliage large, flat, almond-like^ 
dark green, retaining its color late in the fall, when it changes 
to a grayish-green tint, glands remiform in the pure type ; 
flowers very large, light pink in the pure type, but smaller and 
darker colored in many of the mixed descendants ; fruit often 
enormously large, generally more elongated and compressed 
than round, creamy white, with a delicate blush in the pure type, 
but white or yellow in the descendants; skin very delicate and 
thin in the pure type, with a delicate marbled appearance, but 
firmer in many of the descendants; flesh fine grained, soft, 
juicy and melting in the pure type, but firmer in the mixed 
descendants; stone somewhat flat, with medium corrugations 
and pittings, cling, semi-cling, or free; flavor usually mild sub¬ 
acid, with a slight almond suggestion; quality variable; season 
extending throughout the entire season of peach ripening, the 
early varieties predominating. 
Some of the leading commercial features of the group are 
the uniform, prolific bearing of the varieties from year to year, 
and their wide cultural range. The fruit of the group, taken 
as a whole, is larger and m-dre 
delicately colored than other types, 
especially in its early ripening varie¬ 
ties. The most serious commercial 
faults of the group are in the deli¬ 
cate shipping qualities of many of 
the varieties, and the susceptibility 
to rot in the varieties of the pure 
type, and in the early varieties. 
The texture of the skin and flesh is 
firmer than in some crosses, like the 
Elberta, Georgia (Belle), and Hiley, 
while the susceptibility to rot, even 
though much less than in the Hale 
and Alexander types, may be further 
reduced by the rigid selection of still 
less susceptible seedlings. 
The limits of the group for profit¬ 
able culture are still to be experi¬ 
mentally determined. Each variety 
will need to be grown in the 
various peach growing sections 
before its commercial range can be 
decided upon. In general, how¬ 
ever, it may be said that the varie¬ 
ties of the group are extensively 
cultivated in Central and Northern 
Texas, along the coast from the 
Connecticut, in Western Michigan, 
in Northwestern Arkansas, in the peach districts ot Missouri 
and Southern Illinois, and in local areas in the \\ est, especially 
in Western Colorado. It is a significant fact that the group is 
rapidly supplementing, and, in some instances, even replacing 
the older varieties in the orchards that have been planted in 
the last few years. 
HISTORY OF THE GROUP. 
In Europe— The Chinese Cling peach, under the name Shanghai, 
was first sent to England in 1844 from Shanghai, China, by Ivoheit For¬ 
tune, a distinguished horticulturist, who was sent to ( liina 1)} the 
Council of the Horticultural Society of London to collect useful and 
ornamental plants. Fortune forwarded a small potted tree of this 
variety with some of its stones. The seedlings were of a heterogeneous 
character and were used as stocks on which to propagate hom the 
original tree. A considerable number of trees were thereby obtained 
and afterwards distributed. Fortune found this peach growing in 
J. B. Baker, Fort Worth, Texas. 
Vice-President American Association. 
Carolinas northward to 
