Pixie mandarin, also called Pixie tangerine, is a variety of

mandarin Mandarin or The Mandarin may refer to: Language * Mandarin Chinese, branch of Chinese originally spoken in northern parts of the country ** Standard Chinese or Modern Standard Mandarin, the official language of China ** Taiwanese Mandarin, Stand ...

that is late ripening and seedless.

Development

Pixie was developed by Howard Brett Frost at the University of California, Riverside Citrus Research Center in 1927, and was eventually released in 1965 by his colleagues James W. Cameron and Robert K. Soost. Frost was trying to cross two mandarin varieties,

King King is a royal title given to a male monarch. A king is an Absolute monarchy, absolute monarch if he holds unrestricted Government, governmental power or exercises full sovereignty over a nation. Conversely, he is a Constitutional monarchy, ...

and Dancy, to combine the late ripening of the King

tangor The tangor (''C. reticulata'' × ''C. sinensis'') is a citrus fruit hybrid of the mandarin orange (''Citrus reticulata'') and the sweet orange (''Citrus sinensis''). The name "tangor" is a formation from the "tang" of tangerine and the "or" of " ...

with the richness in flavor of Dancy. The result was Kincy, which was large and seedy. Pixie is the second generation progeny of an open pollinated seedling of Kincy; the male parent is uncertain. Thus, the Pixie is either an F2 hybrid resulting from the Kincy

F1 hybrid F1 hybrid (also known as filial 1 hybrid) is the first filial generation of offspring of distinctly different parental types. F1 hybrids are used in genetics, and in selective breeding, where the term F1 crossbreed may be used. The term is somet ...

status, or a hybrid by itself between the Kincy and an unknown donor.

Development

References

Further reading