Tony, it depends what you mean by sweet. If you want sweet like honey my sweetest has been Coe's Golden Drop. But I think some of the pluots probably have higher brix; they just don't taste "sweet as honey". Note that to get any plum that sweet you need to let them hang on the tree for a long time.

Scott

Scott or anyone,

Thanks for the infos. When I was young, my neighbor has a plum tree and the fruit was oval and reddish yellow and it was so sweet and nectar like that bees were always clinged to it. I am search for that kind of sweet plum or plout?

Tony

I agree with Scott that the sweetness of the plum has more to do with fully ripening on the tree than any particular cultivar. I have a Santa Rosa and an Elephant Heart plum and both are sweet as honey when left to ripen fully, but picked a little earlier they are still tart. It is my opinion that if you want a truly perfect plum you need to grow it yourself or have a friend with a tree.

There has been work on Euro plums to get the brix near the mid 20's. These would be the sweetest plums ever bred, I believe. Autumn Sweet is supposed to be one of these and I'm waiting to see how it does in the east coast.

Most very ripe plums are so sweet that no ones going to complain- I agree with that. Euro plums are more a sticky sweet while the Japs are very wet (juicy).

Scott, how productive is CGD for you?

Mid 20s brix is about tops for pluot unless severely dehydrated. The sweetest pluot are advertised at 18-22 brix. I'm planting a new one Crimson Royale that has the highest advertised brix of any pluot I've seen, 22.8. I'm usually able to get some fruit as much as 5-10 points higher brix.

Fruits on any one tree usually vary considerably in brix. Last year I'd say the least variablity within a tree was 2-3 points brix, the most 10-12 points. This is across all stone fruit not just pluot.

Fruitnut,

Where did you order your Crimson Royale from? If the brix is that high around 22.8. I got to have it.

Tony

Tony:

It's only available wholesale from Dave Wilson Nursery. I had to order 10 trees. You can buy Flavor Grenade pluot lots of places. It's listed in the patent application and on DWN website at 22 brix. It is also the heaviest setting pluot I know of. Some are trying it but not many reports from northern or eastern locations yet.

I've included a link that gives brix and size for some pluot at DWN. These are the same numbers listed on the patent applications for these fruits.

I wish more nurseries would give a brix number on their varieties. For example I was interested in an apple that was described as very sweet. The patent application said 12.5 brix, thanks...but no thanks.

Here is a link that might be useful: DWN pluot descriptions

I'm not Scott :) by my Coe's Golden Drop is moderately productive for me, a nice crop but not as big of a crop as my Emerald Beauty next to it. Both of them I try and let hang as long as possible, running the risk of a squirrel/possum raid. The first year I left the Coe's on so long they rotted, and because they had footies on, I didn't notice it. Emerald Beauties are better that way--they will just keep getting sweeter, and don't ever rot.

Carla in Sac

The sweetest I have had was Emerald drop left on the tree a while, lost most tangy taste, super sweet.

Tonytran,

You could be describing Howard Miracle plum.

Fruitnut, you should post pictures of your green house set up!

In case anyone is interested/in the area.
Houston: Kingwood Garden center has flavor king pluot, and some 2 in 1 pluots(I got geo pride/flavor grenade).
Austin: Countryside nursery has 2 in 1 pluots and 3 in 1 pluots.

Green Gage can't be grown in Michigan? I doubt that. There are areas in Michigan solidly in Z6 where GG will have no trouble surviving winters. It will set fruit there as well- then you just pray for a bit of drought during final ripening and your good to go.

Southern France gets summer rain as well and their GG crops are not reliable. GG's a terrible cracker. Plenty of other plums are as sweet brix wise but GG is world class when your lucky enough to get a good one but I think there are several others in the same ambrosia category. Of course taste is subjective but there's an awful lot of amazing plums out there.

I was going to say greengage too. Mine is Coes Golden Drop and ripens in August. It doesn't seem to mind our rainy climate. The fruit are not large but you can sit and eat a couple of pounds without being able to stop. If I could be bothered to thin them they'd probably be larger.

"Rosy Gage" dead ripe. Kind of hard to tell when it is dead ripe, though. Cornell really does a terrific job with plums. I guess any Pluot. "Geo-pride" is a real sugar cube when its ripe. Cracks though.

A sweet as honey plum does not sound all that appealing -- to be honest. Please let us know if you find it so it can be avoided. ;)

Most Japanese plums that I've had will deliver a "taste explosion" similar to sweet but complex plum wine when dead ripe. This is especially true with Beauty. Far more appealing than honey-sweet.

harvestman, I see you asked me a question up there. None of my Euro plums are productive but that is because I planted them too close and mis-pruned them until recently. I think they will be going OK in a year or two but I don't have any reliable data for you on the Coe's.

Carla, I have also had rot problems on my Coes. Not as bad as my Howard Miracle or pluots however.

Does anyone know the brix on a good tree-ripened Euro plum? I looked around for data and only found one Cornell study which had GG at 15 and Italian Prune at 23. I expect the prune plums may be above even the extreme pluots, they are dried precisely because they have lots of natural preservative (sugar) in them. My ripe Coes I would guess were in the 18-20 range.

Scott

Yup, in CA prune plums are commonly dried on the tree as I understand it and here they did the same in our unusually CA type of dry summer last season. Long John was like some kind of exotic tropical fruit once it began to wrinkle from dehydration- very rich and interesting and as different from a typical tree ripened LJ as a completely different clone.

I've always wanted to try Coes but haven't gotten around to ordering it. Victoria is another English type that bears as reliably as even Castleton here- or at least has for the last 4 years. The season before last it stood out when others didn't set. Trouble is, it doesn't get high sugar and main asset besides reliability is its amazing beauty as a fruit.

Old thread but anyway... There are now europlums which have up to 32-33brix. Not available in USA though

Would you tell us a little more about this plum.

Mirabelle de Nancy DOES taste like honey,..too sweet for eating,..[need some acid]

>>GG's a terrible cracker<<

Yes, with too much rain,..for me I don't have that problem.

But WOW..at this yellow stage, Green Gage has just the right combination of sugar and acid.

Konrad: yeah Green Gage is great, but maybe too sweet for me, anyway GG is my kids favorite.
Very sweet euro plum that comes to my mind is Toptaste., In my country it's popular with people who make home made plum brandy who use it for fermentation.
Originally from Germany. In nurseries description they say it has up to 32brix, people usually report around 28brix (it's often compared to candied fruit, therefore too sweet for some ppl likings). Semi cling to freestone (depending on ripening stage), about 40g.
Here it's ripening around 8/18-25 (for comparison we are about a week behind Pennsylvania's AC Nursery harvest chart). Not sure about Edmonton and if it's hardy to zone 3.
Link:
http://www.gartenversandhaus.de/websale7/Pflaume-Toptaste.htm?shopid=chrestensen&act=product&prod_index=P945240