Types of Peaches

At the start of the season, we harvest clingstone peaches, a set of varieties that is descriptively named for the fruit that is attached to the stone or pit of the peach. These peaches are perfect for eating fresh. They’re typically smaller, juicy and sweet, and are ideal for getting peach season off to a fresh start.

Clingstones are also excellent for canning and preserving, but the effort to get the flesh separated from the seed makes the process a bit more cumbersome.

At Pearson Farm, we harvest 12 varieties of clingstone peaches between early May and early June:

These early season peaches have some characteristics of both the clingstone and freestone peach. They combine the sweetness of clingstone peaches with the easiness of freestones for a highly desirable peach. These varieties are mostly available to harvest during the latter part of the month of May, but are fitting for canning projects so that you can enjoy them long into the summer and fall.

Our farm produces 6 varieties of semi-freestone peaches:

As you would expect, freestone peaches are not attached to the pits, making it much easier to slice the fruit. Typically larger than clingstone peaches, freestones are best eaten fresh and are popular in markets and grocery stores mid-summer.

These versatile varieties make great additions to fresh meals and baked goods, but are also wonderful to preserve or can for later use. Once we begin harvesting these varieties in mid-June, they’re available throughout the remainder of the season. Our Prince varieties available in our Pearson Prince Subscription all fall into the freestone category.

Our farm grows 19 varieties of freestone peaches from late May to late July:

Mid to late season, heirloom peaches make their debut with popular varieties that have been established for more than 50 years. These are the peaches we grew up picking, packing and enjoying in summers gone by. These peaches take us back to lazy afternoons spent on porch swings listening to our daddy’s gentle laughter as they told stories and churned homemade peach ice cream. Most of these varieties aren’t shipped and are only available in our retail store.

Heirloom peaches were, throughout the years and advanced farming experience, replaced by varieties that were bred to have redder skins. The breeders in our area worked very hard to ensure that quality and taste was not lost in the breeding process, so it would be difficult for us to say that they are better just because they are heirloom - they’re just the original!

The most popular heirloom peach, the Elberta, has been called America’s Favorite Peach. The Elberta peach tree is typically plentiful, producing up to 150 pounds of peaches in a season. Heirloom peaches are highly memorable because of their size, color and richness - the perfect end to a Georgia peach season.

Heirloom peaches are highly memorable with their size, color and richness - the perfect close to a peach season. At Pearson Farm, we grow 6 varieties of heirloom peaches: