Apricot

PEACH

The peach (Prunus persica) is a deciduous tree, native to Northwest China, in the region between the Tarim Basin and the north slopes of the Kunlun Shan mountains, where it was first domesticated and cultivated. It bears an edible juicy fruit also called a peach.

The species name persica refers to its widespread cultivation in Persia, whence it was transplanted to Europe. It belongs to the genusPrunus which includes the cherry and plum, in the family Rosaceae. The peach is classified with the almond in the subgenus Amygdalus, distinguished from the other subgenera by the corrugated seed shell.

Peaches and nectarines are the same species, even though they are regarded commercially as different fruits. In contrast to peaches, whose fruits present the characteristic fuzz on the skin, nectarines are characterized by the absence of fruit-skin trichomes (fuzz-less fruit); genetic studies suggest nectarines are produced due to a recessive allele, whereas peaches are produced from a dominant allele for fuzzy skin.

China is the world's largest producer of peaches.

Description

Prunus persica grows to 4–10 m (13–33 ft) tall and 6 in. in diameter. The leaves are lanceolate, 7–16 cm (2.8–6.3 in) long, 2–3 cm (0.79–1.18 in) broad, pinnately veined. The flowers are produced in early spring before the leaves; they are solitary or paired, 2.5–3 cm diameter, pink, with five petals. The fruit has yellow or whitish flesh, a delicate aroma, and a skin that is either velvety (peaches) or smooth (nectarines) in different cultivars. The flesh is very delicate and easily bruised in some cultivars, but is fairly firm in some commercial varieties, especially when green. The single, large seed is red-brown, oval shaped, approximately 1.3–2 cm long, and is surrounded by a wood-like husk. Peaches, along with cherries, plums and apricots, are stone fruits (drupes). There are various heirloom varieties, including the Indian peach, which arrives in the latter part of the summer.

Cultivated peaches are divided into clingstones and freestones, depending on whether the flesh sticks to the stone or not; both can have either white or yellow flesh. Peaches with white flesh typically are very sweet with little acidity, while yellow-fleshed peaches typically have an acidic tang coupled with sweetness, though this also varies greatly. Both colours often have some red on their skin. Low-acid white-fleshed peaches are the most popular kinds in China, Japan, and neighbouring Asian countries, while Europeans and North Americans have historically favoured the acidic, yellow-fleshed kinds.

Etymology

The scientific name persica, along with the word "peach" itself and its cognates in many European languages, derives from an early European belief that peaches were native to Persia. The Ancient Romans referred to the peach as malum persicum "Persian apple", later becoming French pêche, hence the English "peach".

History

Although its botanical name Prunus persica refers to Persia (present Iran) from where it came to Europe, genetic studies suggest peaches originated in China, where they have been cultivated since the early days of Chinese culture, circa 2000 BC. Peaches were mentioned in Chinese writings as far back as the 10th century BC and were a favoured fruit of kings and emperors. As of late, the history of cultivation of peaches in China has been extensively reviewed citing numerous original manuscripts dating back to 1100 BC.

Detail of a large portrait of Jane Aynscombe, daughter of Philip Stebbing, grocer and Freeman of Norwich. Jane married Thomas Aynscombe, (died 1740), in 1706.

The peach was brought to India and Western Asia in ancient times. Peach cultivation also went from China, through Persia, and reached Greece by 300 BC. Alexander the Great introduced the fruit into Europe after he conquered the Persians. Peaches were well known to the Romans in first century AD, and were cultivated widely in Emilia-Romagna. Peach trees are portrayed in the wall paintings of the towns destroyed by the Vesuvius eruption of 79 AD, while the oldest known artistic representations of the fruit are in the two fragments of wall paintings, dated back to the 1st century AD, in Herculaneum, now preserved in the National Archaeological Museum in Naples.

Cultivation

Peaches grow very well in a fairly limited range, since they have a chilling requirement that low altitude tropical areas cannot satisfy. In tropical and equatorial latitudes, such as Ecuador, Colombia, Ethiopia, India and Nepal, they grow at higher altitudes that can satisfy the chilling requirement. The trees themselves can usually tolerate temperatures to around −26 to −30 °C (−15 to −22°F), although the following season's flower buds are usually killed at these temperatures, leading to no crop that summer. Flower bud kill begins to occur between −15 and −25°C (5 and −13 F), depending on the cultivar (some are more cold-tolerant than others) and the timing of the cold, with the buds becoming less cold tolerant in late winter.

Typical peach cultivars begin bearing fruit in their third year and have a lifespan of about 12 years. Most cultivars require between 600 and 1,000 hours of chilling; cultivars with chilling requirements of 250 hours (10 days) or less have been developed enabling peach production in warmer climates. During the chilling period, key chemical reactions occur before the plant begins to grow again. Once the chilling period is met, the plant enters the so-called quiescence period, the second type of dormancy. During quiescence, buds break and grow when sufficient warm weather favorable to growth is accumulated. Quiescence is the phase of dormancy between satisfaction of the chilling requirement and the beginning of growth.

Certain cultivars are more tender, and others can tolerate a few degrees colder. In addition, summer heat is required to mature the crop, with mean temperatures of the hottest month between 20 and 30 °C (68 and 86 °F). Another problematic issue in many peach-growing areas is spring frost. The trees tend to flower fairly early in spring. The blooms often can be damaged or killed by frosts; typically, if temperatures drop below about −4 °C (25 °F), most flowers will be killed. However, if the flowers are not fully open, they can tolerate a few degrees colder.

Cultivars

There are hundreds of peach and nectarine cultivars. These are classified into two categories—the freestones and the clingstones. Freestones are those whose flesh separates readily from the pit. Clingstones are those whose flesh clings tightly to the pit. Some cultivars are partially freestone and clingstone, and these are called semi-free. Freestone types are preferred for eating fresh, while clingstone for canning. The fruit flesh may be creamy white or deep yellow; the hue and shade of the color depends on the cultivar.

Peach breeding has favored cultivars with more firmness, more red color, and shorter fuzz on fruit surface. These characteristics ease shipping and supermarket sales by improving eye appeal. However, this selection process has not necessarily led to increased flavor. Peaches have short shelf life, so commercial growers typically plant a mix of different cultivars in order to have fruit to ship all season long.

Different countries have different cultivars. In United Kingdom, for example, the following cultivars have gained the Royal Horticultural Society's Award of Garden Merit:-

· 'Duke of York'

· 'Peregrine'

· 'Rochester'

· Nectarine

Planting

Most peach trees sold by nurseries are cultivars budded or grafted onto a suitable rootstock. This is done to improve predictability of the fruit quality.

Peach trees need full sun, and a layout that allows good natural air flow to assist the thermal environment for the tree. Peaches are planted in early winter. During the growth season, peach trees need a regular and reliable supply of water, with higher amounts just before harvest.

Peaches need nitrogen rich fertilizers more than other fruit trees. Without regular fertilizer supply, peach tree leaves start turning yellow or exhibit stunted growth. Blood meal, bone meal, and calcium ammonium nitrate are suitable fertilizers.

The number of flowers on a peach tree are typically thinned out, because if the full number of peaches mature on a branch, they are under-sized and lacking in flavor. Fruits are thinned midway in the season by commercial growers. Fresh peaches are easily bruised, and do not store well. They are most flavorful when they ripen on the tree and eaten the day of harvest.

The peach tree can be grown in an espalier shape. The Baldassari palmette is a palmette design created around 1950 used primarily for training peaches. In walled gardens constructed from stone or brick, which absorb and retain solar heat and then slowly release it, raising the temperature against the wall, peaches can be grown as espaliers against south-facing walls as far north as southeast Great Britain and southern Ireland.

Production

Important historical peach-producing areas are China, Iran, and the Mediterranean countries, such as France, Italy, Spain and Greece. More recently, the United States (where the three largest producing states are California, South Carolina, and Georgia), Canada (British Columbia), and Australia (the Riverland region) have also become important; peach growing in the Niagara Peninsula of Ontario, Canada, was formerly intensive, but slowed substantially in 2008 when the last fruit cannery in Canada was closed by the proprietors. Oceanic climate areas, like the Pacific Northwest and coastline of northwestern Europe, are generally not satisfactory for growing peaches due to inadequate summer heat, though they are sometimes grown trained against south-facing walls to catch extra heat from the sun. Trees grown in a sheltered and south-facing position in the southeast of England are capable of producing both flowers and a large crop of fruit. In Vietnam, the most famous variety of peach fruit product is grown in Mẫu Sơn commune, Lộc Bình District, Lạng Sơn Province.

For home gardeners, semi-dwarf (3 to 4 m (9.8 to 13.1 ft)) and dwarf (2 to 3 m (6 ft 7 in to 9 ft 10 in)) varieties have been developed by grafting desirable cultivars onto dwarfing rootstock. Fruit size is not affected. Another mutation is flowering peaches, selected for ornamental display rather than fruit production.

The State of Georgia, in the U.S., has long been known as a centre for growers and consumers of peaches. Georgia is known as the "Peach State" because of the production of its peaches. In 1875, Samuel Rumph, a Georgia peach farmer, made possible and practical large-scale peach farming by inventing a refrigerated railcar and mortised-end peach crate; these enabled farmers to ship large quantities of peaches a long distance.

The most productive farms for peaches and nectarines, on average, were in Austria. In comparison to world average yield of 13 metric tons per hectare, Austrian farm yields topped 40 metric tonnes per hectare for each of the years between 2006 and 2010, with highest observed average yield of 56.8 metric tonnes per hectare in 2010.

Depending on climate and cultivar, peach harvest can occur from late May into August (Northern Hemisphere); harvest from each tree lasts about a week

APRICOT

Prunus armeniaca ("Armenian plum"), the most commonly cultivated apricot species, also called ansu apricot, Siberian apricot, Tibetan apricot, is a species of Prunus, classified with the plum in the subgenus Prunus. The native range is somewhat uncertain due to its extensive prehistoric cultivation.

Description

Prunus armeniaca is a small tree, 8–12 m (26–39 ft) tall, with a trunk up to 40 cm (16 in) in diameter and a dense, spreading canopy. The leaves are ovate, 5–9 cm (2.0–3.5 in) long and 4–8 cm (1.6–3.1 in) wide, with a rounded base, a pointed tip and a finely serrated margin. The flowers are 2–4.5 cm (0.8–1.8 in) in diameter, with five white to pinkish petals; they are produced singly or in pairs in early spring before the leaves. The fruit is a drupe similar to a small peach, 1.5–2.5 cm (0.6–1.0 in) diameter (larger in some modern cultivars), from yellow to orange, often tinged red on the side most exposed to the sun; its surface can be smooth (botanically described as: glabrous) or velvety with very short hairs (botanically: pubescent). The flesh is usually firm and not very juicy. Its taste can range from sweet to tart. The single seed is enclosed in a hard, stony shell, often called a "stone", with a grainy, smooth texture except for three ridges running down one side.

History of cultivation

The origin of the species is disputed. It was known in Armenia during ancient times, and has been cultivated there for so long, it is often thought to have originated there. Its scientific namePrunus armeniaca (Armenian plum) derives from that assumption. For example, De Poerderlé, writing in the 18th century, asserted, "Cet arbre tire son nom de l'Arménie, province d'Asie, d'où il est originaire et d'où il fut porté en Europe..." ("this tree takes its name from Armenia, province of Asia, where it is native, and whence it was brought to Europe..."). An archaeological excavation at Garni in Armenia found apricot seeds in an Eneolithic-era site. Despite the great number of varieties of apricots that are grown in Armenia today (about 50), according to Vavilov its center of origin would be the Chinese region, where the domestication of apricot would have taken place. Other sources say that the apricot was first cultivated in India in about 3000 BC.

Its introduction to Greece is attributed to Alexander the Great; later, the Roman General Lucullus (106–57 B.C.) also would have imported some trees – the cherry, white heart cherry, and apricot – from Armenia to Rome. Subsequent sources were often confused about the origin of the species. Loudon (1838) believed it had a wide native range including Armenia, Caucasus, the Himalaya, China, and Japan.

Apricots have been cultivated in Persia since antiquity, and dried ones were an important commodity on Persian trade routes.

More recently, English settlers brought the apricot to the English colonies in the New World. Most of modern American production of apricots comes from the seedlings carried to the west coast by Spanish missionaries.

Today, apricot cultivation has spread to all parts of the globe with climates that support it.

Uses

Seeds or kernels of the apricot grown in central Asia and around the Mediterranean are so sweet, they may be substituted for almonds The Italian liqueur amaretto and amaretti biscotti are flavoured with extract of apricot kernels rather than almonds. Oil pressed from these cultivar kernels, and known as oil of almond, has been used as cooking oil. Kernels contain between 2.05% and 2.40% hydrogen cyanide, but normal consumption is insufficient to produce serious effects.

Etymology

The scientific name armeniaca was first used by Gaspard Bauhin in his Pinax Theatri Botanici (page 442), referring to the species as Mala armeniaca "Armenian apple". It is sometimes stated that this came from Pliny the Elder, but it was not used by Pliny. Linnaeus took up Bauhin's epithet in the first edition of his Species Plantarum in 1753.

The name apricot is probably derived from a tree mentioned as praecocia by Pliny. Pliny says "We give the name of apples (mala)... to peaches (persica) and pomegranates (granata)..." Later in the same section he states "The Asiatic peach ripens at the end of autumn, though an early variety (praecocia) ripens in summer – these were discovered within the last thirty years...".

The classical authors connected Greek armeniaca with Latin praecocia: Pedanius Dioscorides' «... Ἀρμενιακὰ, Ῥωμαιστὶ δὲ βρεκόκκια" and Martial's "Armeniaca, et praecocia latine dicuntur". Putting together the Armeniaca and the Mala obtains the well-known epithet, but there is no evidence the ancients did it; Armeniaca alone meant the apricot. Nonetheless, the 12th century Andalusian agronomist Ibn al-'Awwam refers to the species in the title of chapter 40 of his Kitab al-Filaha as والتفاح الارمني, "apple from Armenia", stating that it is the same as المشمش or البرقوق ("al-mishmish" or "al-barqūq").

Accordingly, the American Heritage Dictionary under apricot derives praecocia from praecoquus, "cooked or ripened beforehand" [in this case meaning early ripening], becoming Greek πραικόκιον praikókion "apricot" and Arabic البرقوق al-barqūq, a term that has been used for a variety of different members of the genus Prunus (it currently refers primarily to the plum in most varieties of Arabic, but some writers use it as a catchall term for Prunus fruit).

The English name comes from earlier "abrecock" in turn from the Middle French abricot, from Catalan abercoc. Both the Catalan and the Spanish albaricoque were adaptations of the Arabic, dating from the Moorish rule of Spain.

However, in Argentina, Chile, and Peru, the word for "apricot" is damasco, which could indicate that, to the Spanish settlers of Argentina, the fruit was associated with Damascusin Syria. The word damasco is also the word for "apricot" in Portuguese (both European and Brazilian, though in Portugal the word alperce is also used).

In culture

The Chinese associate the apricot with education and medicine. For instance, the classical word 杏壇 (literally: 'apricot altar') which means "educational circle", is still widely used in written language. Chuang Tzu, a Chinese philosopher in 4th century BCE, told a story thatConfucius taught his students in a forum surrounded by the wood of apricot trees. The association with medicine in turn comes from the common use of apricot kernels as a component in traditional Chinese medicine, and from the story of Dong Feng (董奉), a physician during the Three Kingdoms period, who required no payment from his patients except that they plant apricot trees in his orchard on recovering from their illnesses, resulting in a large grove of apricot trees and a steady supply of medicinal ingredients. The term "Expert of the Apricot Grove" (杏林高手) is still used as a poetic reference to physicians.

In Armenia, the wood of the apricot tree is used for making wood carvings such as the duduk, which is a popular wind instrument in Armenia and is also called the apricot pipe. Several hand-made souvenirs are also made from the apricot wood.

CHERRY

Prunus avium, commonly called wild cherry, sweet cherry, bird cherry, or gean, is a species of cherry native to Europe, Anatolia, Maghreb, and western Asia, from the British Isles south to Morocco and Tunisia, north to the Trondheim fjord region in Norway and east to the Caucasus and northern Iran, with a small disjunct population in the western Himalaya. This species, in the rose family (Rosaceae), has a diploid set of sixteen chromosomes (2 n = 16). All parts of the plant except for the ripe fruit are slightly toxic, containing cyanogenic glycosides.

Nomenclature

The early history of its classification is somewhat confused. In the first edition of Species Plantarum (1753), Linnaeus treated it as only a variety, Prunus cerasus var. avium, citing Gaspard Bauhin's Pinax theatri botanici (1596) as a synonym, his description, Cerasus racemosa hortensis ("Cherry with racemes, of gardens") shows it was described from a cultivated plant. Linnaeus then changed from a variety to a species Prunus avium in the second edition of his Flora Suecica in 1755.

Sweet cherry was known historically as Gean or Mazzard (also 'massard'), until recently, both were largely obsolete names in modern English.

The name "wild cherry" is also commonly applied to other species of Prunus growing in their native habitats, particularly to the North American species Prunus serotina.

Prunus avium means "bird cherry" in the Latin language. In English "bird cherry" often refers to Prunus padus.

Mazzard

More recently 'Mazzard' has been used to refer to a selected self-fertile cultivar that comes true from seed, and which is used as a seedling rootstock for fruiting cultivars. This term is still used particularly for the varieties of P. avium grown in North Devon and cultivated there, particularly in the orchards at Landkey

Description and ecology

Prunus avium is a deciduous tree growing to 15–32 m (50–100 ft) tall, with a trunk up to 1.5 m (5 ft) in diameter. Young trees show strong apical dominance with a straight trunk and symmetrical conical crown, becoming rounded to irregular on old trees. The bark is smooth purplish-brown with prominent horizontal grey-brown lenticels on young trees, becoming thick dark blackish-brown and fissured on old trees. The leaves are alternate, simple ovoid-acute, 7–14 cm (3–6 in) long and 4–7 cm (2–3 in) broad, glabrous matt or sub-shiny green above, variably finely downy beneath, with a serrated margin and an acuminate tip, with a green or reddish petiole 2–3.5 cm (0.8–1.4 in) long bearing two to five small red glands. The tip of each serrated edge of the leaves also bear small red glands. In autumn, the leaves turn orange, pink or red before falling. The flowers are produced in early spring at the same time as the new leaves, borne in corymbs of two to six together, each flower pendent on a 2–5 cm (0.8–2 in) peduncle, 2.5–3.5 cm (1–1.4 in) in diameter, with five pure white petals, yellowish stamens, and a superior ovary; they are hermaphroditic, and pollinated by bees. The fruit is a drupe 1–2 cm (0.4–0.8 in) in diameter (larger in some cultivated selections), bright red to dark purple when mature in midsummer, edible, variably sweet to somewhat astringent and bitter to eat fresh. Each fruit contains a single hard-shelled stone 8–12 mm long, 7–10 mm wide and 6–8 mm thick, grooved along the flattest edge; the seed (kernel) inside the stone is 6–8 mm long.

Prunus avium in spring.

The fruit are readily eaten by numerous kinds of birds and mammals, which digest the fruit flesh and disperse the seeds in their droppings. Some rodents, and a few birds (notably the Hawfinch), also crack open the stones to eat the kernel inside. All parts of the plant except for the ripe fruit are slightly toxic, containing cyanogenic glycosides.

The leaves provide food for some animals, including Lepidoptera such as the case-bearer moth Coleophora anatipennella.

The tree exudes a gum from wounds in the bark, by which it seals the wounds to exclude insects and fungal infections.

Cultivation and uses

Fruit. Some eighteenth and nineteenth century botanical authors assumed a western Asia origin for the species based on the writings of Pliny; however, archaeological finds of seeds from prehistoric Europe contradict this view. Wild cherries have been an item of human food for several thousands of years. The stones have been found in deposits at Bronze Age settlements throughout Europe, including in Britain. In one dated example, wild cherry macrofossils were found in a core sample from the detritus beneath a dwelling at an Early and Middle Bronze Age pile-dwelling site on and in the shore of a former lake at Desenzano del Garda or Lonato, near the southern shore of Lake Garda, Italy. The date is estimated at Early Bronze Age IA, carbon dated there to 2077 BC plus or minus 10 years. The natural forest was largely cleared at that time.

By 800 BC, cherries were being actively cultivated in Asia Minor, and soon after in Greece.

As the main ancestor of the cultivated cherry, the sweet cherry is one of the two cherry species which supply most of the world's commercial cultivars of edible cherry (the other is the sour cherry Prunus cerasus, mainly used for cooking; a few other species have had a very small input). Various cherry cultivars are now grown worldwide wherever the climate is suitable; the number of cultivars is now very large. The species has also escaped from cultivation and become naturalised in some temperate regions, including southwestern Canada, Japan, New Zealand, and the northeast and northwest of the United States.

Ornamental. It is often cultivated as a flowering tree. Because of the size of the tree, it is often used in parkland, and less often as a street or garden tree. The double-flowered form, 'Plena', is commonly found, rather than the wild single-flowered forms.

Two interspecific hybrids, P. x schmittii (P. avium x P. canescens) and P. x fontenesiana (P. avium x P. mahaleb) are also grown as ornamental trees.

Timber. The hard, reddish-brown wood (cherry wood) is valued as a hardwood for woodturning, and making cabinets and musical instruments. Cherry wood is also used for smoking foods, particularly meats, in North America, as it lends a distinct and pleasant flavor to the product.

Дата добавления: 2015-07-10