North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Claude Jolicoeur <cjoli@gmc.ulaval.ca>]

Doug,
Yes my Mirabelle is of quite good quality, and I would say more than just 
"suitable" for fresh eating when well ripe. The racoons are also very found 
of it so I usually have to harvest a bit before full maturity. It ripens 
about a week later than Mont-Royal.

Next year I intend to take close-up pictures of the flowers and count the 
stamens - I read in Plums of NY that P.insititia have a different number of 
stamens than P.communis, so hopefully this test should confirm if it is 
really a Mirabelle. If you want, I could sent you a picture off list - I 
have a nice one with Mirabelle and Blue Damas side by side to compare sizes.

Claude


At 01:55 2009-11-17, you wrote:
> Claude, is your Mirabelle of decent quality, and suitable for fresh eating?
>
> I would be surprised if some of the settlers of New France had not
> planted seeds of Mirabelles from France. I would also have expected them
> to try grafted trees from France at some point.
>
> Stanley is a shade hardier than Mount Royal (though liable to black
> knot, and from my limited observation not very good quality on peach
> soils at least for fresh eating) and if I remember rightly it came from
> a cross between Prune D'Agen and Grand Duke; (I forget the direction)
> i.e. old European plums.
>
> But also, around 1985 I observed in an old plum orchard in the Niagara
> Peninsula, several trees with small, round, rather bland fruits of
> various colours including yellow, which I deduced were sprouts from
> rootstocks of perhaps St. Julien, where the tops of commercial cultivars
> had died. And (for the benefit of the newbies), damsons, Mirabelles, and
> the St. Julien rootstocks are subgroups of Prunus insititia of Europe.
>
> Doug Woodard