King Tangor

UCR describes King as a natural tangor of Asian origin that reached Riverside from South Vietnam in 1880. Its reproduced 1967 account attributes this origin narrative to Webber (1943), credits John A. Bingham with arranging shipment, and reports an 1882 transfer of seedlings and budwood to J. C. Stovin in Florida. UCR separately records CRC 303 budwood received in 1914 and CRC 3845 seed from a CRC Plant Breeding seedling received in 1931; the pages do not establish that the accessions are identical.^⁠[1]⁠[4]

UCR’s CRC 303 page describes a medium-sized, upright, open tree and large oblate fruit with thick rind ranging from smooth to very rough depending on rootstock and environment. It describes yellow-orange to orange rind, deep-orange tender flesh, and a moderate number of seeds, and says very hot conditions are needed for acceptable fruit quality. UCR lists the Riverside ripening season as February–April.^⁠[1]

The 1967 King description reproduced on UCR’s CRC 303 page characterizes the fruit as oblate to depressed-globose, with thick peel and 12–14 readily separable segments around a large hollow axis. It describes deep-orange, tender flesh, few-to-many seeds, and late to very late maturity. This is a historical cultivar description, not a controlled trial of the current accession.^⁠[1]

The same historical description characterizes the tree as moderately vigorous, medium-sized, upright and open, with large dark-green foliage. It reports crop-related branch breakage and fruit sunburn, and calls the tree cold-resistant but less so than most mandarins. No measured cold threshold is given.^⁠[1]