Gold Nugget Mandarin Problems

[Johnny Eat Fruit]

As my Gold Nugget Tree matures and produces more fruit I am finding the fruit quality to be somewhat inconsistent. I have noticed the larger fruit left on the tree until late April or May dry out and become uneatable. The smaller fruit that are less bumpy and have thin skin are excellent and are among the best I have tasted this season.  The gold Nugget has a lower juice content compared to most other mandarins but late in the season many fruit are drying out completely. When you get a good one it's wonderful but too many of my fruit are less than perfect, what a shame.

My Yosemite Gold mandarin is much more consistent so far with all of the fruit so far being juicy and having excellent flavor. Yes the Gold Nugget is sweeter and certain smaller fruit on the tree beat the Yosemite Gold but there is a high level of fruit variability with the Gold Nugget cultivar. I am throwing away most of the large Bumpy fruit and just eating the smaller, smooth skinned fruit on my 14 foot tall tree. It is almost like there is two varieties being produced from the same tree with one being great and the other being poor.   

Johnny

[brian]

My experience buying gold nugget mandarins at the grocery store has been similar... often they are dried out and have puffy skin.   I try to buy ones that seem less puffy.

I have a golden nugget tree but haven't gotten fruit yet, so I can't comment on that part.

[Millet]

Mandarins do not hang well if let on he tree for a longer period.  They do get puffy.

[Johnny Eat Fruit]

Certain Mandarins like the page, Yosemite Gold and Kinnow in general do not get puffy and dry out nearly as much.

Evidently the Gold Nugget is very suspectable to this drying out effect much more than other varieties of mandarins. The smaller fruit on the Gold Nugget are far better in terms of eating quality. The problem is with the larger fruit, which are already low in juice, becoming a ball of citrus fiber with poor flavor.  This year I have about 200 fruit on my Gold Nugget tree and about 25-30% were sub standard. On the positive side about 25% of the fruit are awesome and taste great. The other 50% of the fruit on the tree are somewhere in between with quality ranging from good to very good but short of outstanding.

The fruit quality on the Gold Nugget is quite variable. The Yosemite Gold is much more consistent and juicer even though it's sugar content is lower and doesn't hit the highs of the best Gold nugget.   

I have been eating the last of my Yosemite Gold's recently and they are getting sweeter while still retaining there high juice content.

No fruit is perfect but the Gold Nugget is overrated as being the best new mandarin.

Johnny

[brettay]

Interesting.  I thought I was the only one.  This description exactly fits my gold nugget tree this year.  Gold nugget is supposed to hold very well on the tree into the summer, but perhaps not.

[containerman]

my GN gave me about 50 fruit this year and I grow mine in a 1/2 wine barrel long with all 14 of my citrus trees. We ate all of them by late March. Mine were easy to peal and also juicy not dry so I'm not sure if my area and growing conditions near Modesto make any difference in the results. I'm very happy with my G.N. I also have all 3 of the other golds. The Yosemite, Shasta and Tahoe. I will have fruit this next season on my Yosemite and Shasta. The Tahoe has produced for a few years now and they are really good but I like the G.N. better. I have kishu, Okitsu Wase Satsuma and Honey as well.

[Bush2Beach]

My Gold Nugget in the ground has fruits ripe January / February and will not hold past early April. Though they say wait until April.

[Badfish8696]

No problem with Gold Nugget here in SoCal. Mine has been in ground for about 8 years from a 5 gallon tree, it is on trifoliate and is roughly 6-8ft in size, I think it will max out around 10ft. I am about 15 miles inland and get plenty of heat. The fruit is still eating well in May this year, juicy, rich, seedless even interplanted with 15+ other types of citrus. Certainly a great fruit for eating from hand.

[spaugh]

My neighbor dropped a bag of GN off here a few weeks ago.  They were all sweet and juicy.  15mI inland here as well.  I have a small tree on standard rootstock.  Seems to be growing quitell fast but only been in less than a year. 

[z_willus_d]

my GN gave me about 50 fruit this year and I grow mine in a 1/2 wine barrel long with all 14 of my citrus trees. We ate all of them by late March. Mine were easy to peal and also juicy not dry so I'm not sure if my area and growing conditions near Modesto make any difference in the results. I'm very happy with my G.N. I also have all 3 of the other golds. The Yosemite, Shasta and Tahoe. I will have fruit this next season on my Yosemite and Shasta. The Tahoe has produced for a few years now and they are really good but I like the G.N. better. I have kishu, Okitsu Wase Satsuma and Honey as well.

My 3 year old GN is also planted in a container (about 35-gal in size).  It only really set much fruit this past season (maybe 50 or so), and when the fruit were less ripe (Dec/Jan/Feb), I was in heaven.  I've never been too keen for Mandarins, but this one was just my number.  The like-aged/potted Tango sitting next to it was also good, but not nearly as excellent.  I thought that as the GN fruit ripened and fully "oranged," they would grow even better.  Sadly, that was not the case.  The last of my GN fruit picked in late March was no match for the original, ostensibly unripe fruit I had picked a month or two before.  Regardless, I ordered another GN for the future.  It sounds like all of us Northern CA folks are experiencing similar results, whereas southern and near the sea aren't having any issues; though, granted, the sample size is tiny here.

[Johnny Eat Fruit]

My gold Nugget is on C-35 rootstock which is considered standard. If I had to do it over again I would use semi-dwarf (trifoliate) rootstock, from durling nursery, which tends to produce smaller more intensely flavored fruit.  The larger fruit on my Gold Nugget is indeed Sub-standard. This is classified as a late-season mandarin but based on my experience is a mid-season variety that dries out more quickly than other mandarin cultivars. In 30+ years of growing citrus I have never experienced this level of eating quality variation. As Previously stated Gold Nugget can produce some excellent fruit and at it's best is wonderful but its juice content is lower than every other mandarin I have eaten.  The key to success is catching it at the right time and selecting the smaller fruit for maximum quality.  The large lumpy fruit are far more variable. At my location, I am about 5-6 miles inland from the coast.

The perfect mandarine for me would be a combination of the following:

-  The large size and juiciness of the Yosemite Gold mandarin
-  The intense rich and complex flavor of the Kinnow and Page mandarins (The Page is also extremely juicy and makes great juice but the fruit are too small in general)
-  The sweetness of the Gold Nugget at its peak

At the present time no such citrus exists, or is likely to, so I can do is what John Lennon says is "Imagine".

Johnny

[Badfish8696]

My Gold Nugget along with most of my citrus is from Durling and on their semi-dwarf rootstocks which in most cases is trifoliate. 12x10 spacing. Pretty happy I made that decision when planting as although I have the room for standard trees, I knew they would get huge and require a lot of water, fertilizer, possible pruning, etc. Even an 8ft diameter tree will require 10 gallons of water per day in the summer. The fact that trifoliate may produce better fruit is a bonus that I did not know when planting. I am going to be planting 16 mandarins that I have grafted onto C-35 soon so it will be interesting to compare. Shiranui, Xie Shan, Miho Wase, USDA 88-2.

[containerman]

Johnny have you ever tried an Okitsu Wase Satsuma ? They are early producers Dec-Jan and so far are my favorite mandarin for size, taste, juice etc........

[Johnny Eat Fruit]

I have never planted the Satsuma mandarin or any of it's variants. The standard Satsumas are juicy but can not match the flavor of the top mid season mandarins that start in January. It is personal preference I suppose but since I have limited space I tend to want to grow the most flavorful varieties that are available.  If you really want citrus in November to December the Satsuma is a good alternative but the flavor of the Page mandarin, Cara Cara Pink Navel and Washington Navel that start to mature in early January are superior in my opinion.

There is nothing wrong with the Satsuma but I have found it's flavor to be just average, not exceptional, so it comes down to personal preferences and how early you want to start eating citrus.

If the Okitsu Wase Satsuma has improved flavor compared to the standard Satsuma it might be worth trying (or Grafting) but I already have a lot of citrus that start producing in January.

Johnny

[containerman]

Johnny read this article on the Okitsu

http://www.fruitmentor.com/okitsu-wase-satsuma

[Johnny Eat Fruit]

Sounds like the Okitsu might be worth trying if you want a earlier season mandarin. I personally have a number of excellent citrus trees with fruit stat start to ripen in January so I have no interest at this time. In November to December I am still eating fresh apples off my apple trees in the back yard and I love the taste of homegrown apples as they have superior flavor and a much higher juice content than the store fruit.

Johnny