WADDELL
1. Ga. Sta. Bul. 42:242. 1898. 2. Del. Sta. Rpt. 13:111 fig. 9. 1901. 3. Am. Pom. Soc. Rpt. 249. 1903. 4. Budd-Hansen Am. Hort. Man. 2:358. 1903. 5. Ohio Sta. Bul. 170:182. 1906. 6. Am. Pom. Soc. Cat. 39. 1909. 7. Waugh Am. Peach Orch. 208. 1913.
Waddell is an early mid-season, white-fleshed, semi-cling peach from Georgia, a very evident descendant of Chinese Cling. The variety is now widely grown and is everywhere esteemed as a commercial sort. Its chief competitor is Carman, compared with which the fruit differs in ripening a few days early; is handsomer, in color at least, the two, as the color-plates show, being very similar in size and shape; is of rather finer texture of flesh and is better flavored; and, lastly, according to most reports, Waddell is a better shipper than Carman. The variety has not been nearly as widely nor as generally planted as the better-known Carman but we are of the opinion that it has been a greater factor in the success of a score or more of the big commercial peach-orchards, North and South, of the last few years. It is a particularly pleasing peach in New York and ought to be considered for every commercial plantation where a variety of its season is wanted to precede or to compete with Carman.
Waddell is a chance seedling found by William Waddell, Griffin, Georgia. The variety was introduced by J. H. Hale, South Glastonbury, Connecticut. The American Pomological Society added Waddell to its fruit-list in 1909.
WADDELL
Tree medium in size, vigorous, upright becoming spreading and with the lower branches inclined to droop, hardy, productive; trunk thick, smooth; branches stocky, smooth, reddish-brown tinged with light ash-gray; branchlets long, inclined to rebranch, dark pinkish-red overspread with green, glossy, smooth, glabrous, with numerous conspicuous, raised lenticels variable in size.
Leaves six inches long, one and three-fourths inches wide, folded upward and curled downward, oval to obovate-lanceolate, leathery; upper surface dull, dark green, smooth; lower surface grayish-green; apex acuminate; margin finely serrate, tipped with reddish-brown glands; petiole three-eighths inch long, with one to four small, globose, reddish-brown glands variable in position.
Flower-buds hardy, conical or pointed, pubescent, usually appressed; blossoms appear in mid-season; flowers one and three-fourths inches across, red becoming pale pink, in clusters of twos; pedicels short, slender, glabrous, green; calyx-tube reddish-green at the base, greenish-yellow within, campanulate, glabrous; calyx-lobes broad, obtuse, glabrous within, pubescent without; petals oval, crenate, irregular in outline near the base, tapering to claws with reddish base; filaments seven-sixteenths inch long, shorter than the petals; pistil pubescent near the base, equal to the stamens in length.
Fruit matures in early mid-season; two and one-fourth inches long, about two inches wide, oval to roundish-oval, compressed, bulged on one side, with unequal halves; cavity deep, abrupt, with tender skin, tinged with pink; suture shallow, deepening toward the apex and extending beyond; apex roundish, with a small, mucronate tip; color creamy-white, blushed with red and with a few dull splashes of darker red; pubescence thick; skin tough, separates from the pulp; flesh white, stained with pink near the pit, juicy, stringy firm but tender, sweet but sprightly, aromatic; very good in quality; stone semi-free to free, one and three-eighths inches long, one inch wide, ovate; ventral suture deeply grooved along the sides, faintly winged; dorsal suture grooved, not winged.