Mackinaw Peach Seeds

 The Circus in Your Mouth is from Northern Michigan

“Well they’re in!” We named this peach after the episode of Seinfeld where Kramer enters eating a "Mackinaw Peach" from Oregon which is ripe for only two weeks a year. “It’s like having a circus in your mouth!” Kramer exclaims. It is a miracle of nature and like the Aurora borealis, it is here for only a short period of time.

Mackinaw peaches ripen late in the season which slowly ripen into mid September about a week or two after most of the commercially grown peaches in my region in southwestern Michigan. This northern Michigan heirloom peach is grown from seed  producing peaches which are cling-stone meaning the flesh sticks to the stone or pit.  For me it was an accidental discovery of growing numerous seed strains of peaches that can tolerate my non peach like world of late frosts and other peach like calamities like brown rot and viruses. The original seeds came from seedling peaches in Canada, Wisconsin and Michigan.  I winnowed out the trees to less than a half dozen of the best producers that showed no signs of disease or insects. In the end it produced two distinct types of fruit which were kept due to their high yields and delicious flavor. The fruit is best if left to ripen on the tree. That is were the circus in your mouth experience begins.  

What the Mackinaw peach is and is not. 

Mackinaw peaches are not seedlings of commercial peach varieties, individual plant breeders or a rootstock used for peaches. The Mackinaw peach is produced from seed and is not grafted. It is an heirloom selection that was grown from pits and spread that way rather than grafting. Luckily people were not discouraged to grow it from seed otherwise it would never have adapted to its northern locations. For that you need generational populations to make this happen.  From seed, it is considered a land race peach which is grown from seed. It is uniform enough to produce this way despite being open pollinated. With a little more growing out and a larger planting, the pits would quickly create a seed orchard much like peaches are grown in the wild or naturalized as a type of feral peach that is found in the southwestern United States.  

This package contains 25 seeds for orchard establishment plus scions (if requested) of the selections to aid in further establishing a population of Mackinaw peaches for future distribution within the nursery and fruit industry.

The name is everything and 'Mackinaw Peach' is top of the list for google search for my seed listings. For this reason alone, consider propagating this plant to meet an ever growing demand for a disease and insect free peach that can be propagated from pits.

The Mackinaw peach can easily be grown using organic methods and is resistant to disease and insects. 

TO GERMINATE THE SEEDS:  Soak the seeds for 12 hours at room temperature. Wash the seeds thoroughly and then add a lightly moist media to a plastic bag. Store for another 24 hours before refrigeration for 60-90 days. Some seeds will split in dormancy others will sprout once warmed for 30-60 days. Some pits will not split and these can be further enhanced to sprout by putting the sutures on a bench grinder. This will allow moisture to enter easier and speed up the germination.

This package contains 25 pits of the Mackinaw peaches of two forms both red and yellow. This will allow you to reproduce it under the Mackinaw Peach name as well as sell the seeds and plants to others in the nursery and fruit industry. From seed, some production of peaches occurs in the  3rd or 4th year from seed. Do not thin the fruits. Scions can be used to establish the trees on rootstocks, but it is best if this strain be produced by using a diversity of seedlings and not as an individual cultivar clones. The scions can be requested with the purchase of the seed to speed up this process if you need this.