Author Topic: There Is A New Mandarin In Town  (Read 2891 times)

Millet

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There Is A New Mandarin In Town
« on: January 09, 2017, 03:53:32 PM »
There’s a new mandarin orange in town: the Super Nova. For almost 50 years, the fruit has tantalized visitors to university citrus variety collections with its gorgeous dark orange color, its convenient seedlessness, its rich balance of sweetness and acidity — and its superb aromatics. Now, this mandarin is finally available commercially. And although the citrus won’t chase Cuties and Halos from markets any time soon, its excellence is outmatched only by the curious convolutions of its history and nomenclature.

It was in 1966 that Jack Hearn, an Orlando-based citrus breeder for the U.S. Department of Agriculture, crossed two sibling mandarin varieties, Lee and Nova, seeking to understand their pollination requirements. By chance, one such hybrid, then called 6-13-44, had extraordinarily fine flavor and was seedless, a rare trait among mandarins at the time. It had only one problem: The trees bore no fruit.

“In 34 years, I’ve seen it yield a good crop exactly once,” said Randall Driggers, a USDA researcher based in Fort Pierce, Fla.

Hoping the variety might produce better in California, Hearn in 1988 sent budwood for propagating to UC Riverside, where it  became known as USDA 88-2, Lee × Nova (thanks to its parentage) and Novalee. There, indeed, the trees did bear moderately successful crops, though not exactly gangbusters.

http://www.latimes.com/food/dailydish/la-fo-mandarin-orange-20161214-story.html

mrtexas

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Re: There Is A New Mandarin In Town
« Reply #1 on: January 09, 2017, 08:34:58 PM »
I had a fairly large tree of 88-2 maybe 8 feet tall in Beaumont before I moved. Since then it has been
poodle cut and not fertilized in 4 years. I have eaten several of the fruit and liked it. It is a shy bearer.
That is why I think the USDA released it as it is unlikely to be commercial and not particularly easily peeled. It is later than satsuma.
I inferred this talking to a USDA guy by email who noticed I was growing it from my website.
I got budwood when it was an early release maybe 6-8 years ago.
« Last Edit: January 09, 2017, 08:37:05 PM by mrtexas »

brettay

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Re: There Is A New Mandarin In Town
« Reply #2 on: January 09, 2017, 11:11:55 PM »
This variety is featured in UCR's "Tried and True or Something New" brochure written by Toni Seibert and Tracy Kahn.  It's a fun read, although most of the varieties are well-known to the true citrus aficionados on this website.  This was one of the only varieties I hadn't heard of.  Hopefully, there will be available budwood this fall.

http://anrcatalog.ucanr.edu/pdf/8472.pdf

-Brett

Waiting

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Re: There Is A New Mandarin In Town
« Reply #3 on: January 10, 2017, 06:08:30 PM »
How about the "DaisySL" mentioned at the end of the article?

brettay

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Re: There Is A New Mandarin In Town
« Reply #4 on: January 11, 2017, 04:17:58 PM »
How about the "DaisySL" mentioned at the end of the article?

David Karp, the author, states elsewhere that the Daisy SL is his favorite tasting mandarin.  It used to be available through UCR's Citrus Clonal Protection Program, however  I don't see it there anymore.  Also, to purchase it you needed a license agreement, and I'm not sure if the average consumer is allowed to have a license agreement.  Regardless, it sounds like it would be a fantastic addition to anyone's citrus collection.

-Brett

Millet

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Re: There Is A New Mandarin In Town
« Reply #5 on: January 11, 2017, 04:36:17 PM »
David Karp is a very interesting fellow.  He is commonly known as "The Fruit Detective" .   His life story is rather strange.  I recently heard that David is now  currently working at the University of California Riverside. He is also a free lance writer for the LA Times. 

snowjunky

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Re: There Is A New Mandarin In Town
« Reply #6 on: January 17, 2018, 04:21:24 AM »
How about the "DaisySL" mentioned at the end of the article?

David Karp, the author, states elsewhere that the Daisy SL is his favorite tasting mandarin.  It used to be available through UCR's Citrus Clonal Protection Program, however  I don't see it there anymore.  Also, to purchase it you needed a license agreement, and I'm not sure if the average consumer is allowed to have a license agreement.  Regardless, it sounds like it would be a fantastic addition to anyone's citrus collection.

-Brett

This is an email I got from Rock at CCPP about the Daisy SL:
"The Daisy SL was removed from the CCPP budwood list by the holder. We don’t know when it will be back. Also, it is a licensed variety, only grower and nurseryman can have a costly agreement with the holder to purchase it"