TOPIC: Another flurry of pictures--Ginseng and peaches

We're at the time now, here in the Valley of East Tn. that most ginseng has set it's berries or they are close to it. I thought it would be a good time to show just where things are. Many of my ripe berries are planted now and the pictures I'm going to show are the later maturing ones.
The Wild Kentucky Ginseng plant. About 20 years old. A nice mature, full, berry pod.

Right along side of it is the Wild Tennessee Ginseng. A little younger plant and the berries are at about the same stage as the Kentucky plant.

The weather has had a dramatic effect on ginseng plants here this season and they are turning yellow and going down right now.

The largest and oldest plants have not been affected by the weather as badly and they still look good.

From this point on it is all peaches. I thought some of the fellows who grow fruit might like to see how the trees look in Mid-Late Summer. I have a new variety coming in called Carolina Gold and it is looking beautiful. Almost every peach is in the 2 3/4 -3 inch range and they really taste great. Maya, you can see how the look when they are thinned properly. Almost all of them are number1 fruit.

There are bushels and bushels of these hanging , just ready to start picking. Hill, I'll swap you about 3 bushels of these for your berries:)

Maya, you can see how thinning them to 6 inches apart causes them to almost be touching by the time they are ready to pick. These peaches are a solid 3 inch diameter peach.

This is the next variety that will be ripening. China Pearl. It's a beautiful White peach.

Beautiful Hugh! Do they pick easy? I've never picked peaches. What does the white one taste like?
We try to thin to 5-6\" too. I had such a poor fruit set I tried to thin lightly this year though.I've got some doubles out there.

Hey will you look at my thread on the hunting ginseng forum and tell me what the heck you think this thing is up in these trees. The pic is on page 3.

Thanks Maya. They are pretty easy to pick. You generally put your full hand around the peach and twist it with a motion that pops the peach toward the stem end of the branch. If you go the other way it can break the fruit bearing stem off. There are a few varieties that tend to drop as they get ripe and you can lose a whole crop in a thunderstorm. I have one getting ripe in a few days called the Belle Of Georgia. It is considered one of the best tasting peaches in the country. Extremely sweet and juicy, but it has that bad habit of dropping. I would trade Hill some of those for berries, but he might die because they are so good.