Redstar Peach (Spring 2027)

This is our first year growing Redstar ourselves. Other than what we've seen of it around Montana, everything below is secondhand until we get more long-term data from our own mother trees.

Overview

Redstar is a mostly red, yellow-fleshed peach that ripens with Redhaven. Of all the peaches we've seen in Montana, it's the most prolific: the longest living, the heaviest bearing and the most consistent bearing of the bunch.

Origin and History

Redstar came out of the Stellar breeding program at Fruit Acres Farm in Coloma, Michigan, the same program behind Glowingstar. It was patented in 1998 as FA 52 by Annette and Randy Bjorge, and it's an open-pollinated seedling of Newhaven.

Fruit and Uses

The patent describes the fruit as 65 to 80 mm across (about 2½ to 3 inches) with an 80% red blush over yellow-orange. The flesh is yellow, semi-freestone and doesn't brown when cut. It ripens with Redhaven or up to a few days after, and here in Missoula that means mid-August. The patent calls it a dessert and fresh market peach and rates its shipping and keeping quality as excellent. Ontario's agriculture ministry notes it has few split pits.

Growth Habit and Spacing

Ours are on Prairie Red plum, which makes a semi-dwarf peach around 15 feet here, maybe closer to 20 in really deep soil. Plan on 12 to 15 feet between trees. The patent describes a vigorous, spreading, very productive tree that ripens its crop over two pickings, and Rutgers says it has to be thinned hard and early to get big peaches. It also has good resistance to bacterial spot according to the patent, Rutgers, the University of Missouri and Ontario's agriculture ministry.

Pollination

Redstar is self-fertile, so one tree will set fruit.

Cold Hardiness

The patent calls Redstar "very cold hardy," with a tree and blossoms hardier than its parent, but it doesn't give a temperature, and Stark Bro's and most other nurseries rate it zone 5. It's survived -25F at Tom McCamant's Forbidden Fruit Orchard in Paradise, MT, so we list it as hardy to -25F (zone 4b). It's not as hardy as Contender, though, and certainly not as hardy as Siberian C. Keep in mind that with any peach, the flower buds give out well before the tree does, so a hard winter can cost you a crop even when the tree comes through fine.

About the photo: this isn’t Redstar itself. Photos of Redstar are either under copyright or simply unavailable, so we picked the open-source image that looks closest to the fruit. Photo: “Peaches through the netting” by Paul Long (plong), via Flickr, licensed CC BY 2.0.