Hi. Rated chilling hours are a contentious issue. Many of us in low-chill California have found that climatically inappropriate varieties do well.

I am curious- why did you plant Moorpark if you knew it wasn't supposed to produce in our area? Was it an experiment? How long has it been in the ground?

I have wanted to experiment with this variety because of its reputation as one of the best apricots. Maybe your success will encourage me to do so.

The trick to grow high chill varieties in the warmer parts of Calif. is to grow them on the north side of hill or anywhere they can get shaded for a good part of the Winter. This makes a big difference in chill accumulations.

I have a moorpark apricot up here in the Santa Cruz mountains and it hasn't broken dormancy yet even though we've already had 600+ hours of chill so far, and it's definitely colder here than on the north side of a hill in Orange county. This is most likely because it's too cold for it to break out of dormancy yet.

Bvbrown, I bought the Moorpark because I had read in a gardening book that its supposed to be the best tasting apricot in the world, and the standard by which all others are measured. Plus this one was the only one I had ever seen for sale in Orange County, so figured I better buy it while I had the chance. BTW, the book also said the Moorpark has been around for I think it was 800 years as a named variety, so if I wanted to plant any of its pits they would probably come true from seed. Actually for the first two years it didn't produce and I was ready to rip it out, but gave it one more year and it finally started producing two years ago, and the crops keep getting bigger as it gets older.

californian,
All the apricots(including Moorpark) I planted 12-15 years ago are now gone, but bloom period here in KY was not much later than what you're experiencing - it was not at all uncommon for mine to bloom before March 1 - long before the end of winter. We're not talking damage from a freak late frost, we're talking absolute certain freeze and total loss of crop. Every year. Without fail.

I hope this isn't too obvious, but have you painted the trunk white and mulched around it? That's supposed to help it keep cool a bit longer.

Californian: That is really interesting! My experience with low-chill apricots has been that Blenheim/Royal is productive and very high-quality, Joe's Italian is extremely reliable, but not as good, Goldkist is reliable but inferior to R/B, and Katy was unproductive (I gave it 7 years!). I will have to try Moorpark.

Thanks,
Brian