Fruit late, season short; medium in size, roundish, slightly truncate, purplish-brown, splashed and mottled with russet about the base, overspread with thick bloom; flesh greenish-yellow, sweet; good to very good; stone often reddish, clinging, three-quarters inch by one-half inch in size, somewhat flat, irregular-oval, with slightly pitted surfaces.
LATE ORLEANS
LATE ORLEANS
Prunus domestica
1. Lond. Hort. Soc. Cat. 151. 1831. 2. Mag. Hort. 164. 1843. 3. Jour. Hort. N. S. 15:301. 1868. 4. Downing Fr. Trees Am. 927. 1869. 5. Guide Prat. 161, 360. 1895. 6. Garden 49:268. 1896. 7. Rivers Cat. 33. 1898.
Black Orleans 1, 2, 5. Late Black Orleans 3, 4. Late Black Orleans 5. Late Orleans 5. Monsieur Noir Tardif 5. Orleans Late Black 5.
This is another variety having only a European reputation to recommend it in America. The fruits of Late Orleans are handsome in color and shape, but are not large enough to enable them to compete in the markets with other late purple plums and are so poor in quality as to be worthless as dessert fruits. In Europe the variety is rated high for culinary purposes and fruit-growers there like it because it hangs well to the tree and keeps and ships well. The trees are very satisfactory in practically all respects. It is doubtful if the variety is worth further trial in America.
Late Orleans was mentioned in the catalog of the Horticultural Society of London in 1831, but was not described. No account seems to have ever been published of its origin, but it is probably related to or descended from the Orleans since they are very similar in tree and shape of fruit, differing only in size and color of fruit.