Citrus Cultivars

Citrus varieties developed at the Florida Agricultural Experiment Station, an agricultural and natural resource research program of the University of Florida’s Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (IFAS), are licensed by the Florida Foundation Seed Producers, Inc.  If your company is interested in licensing citrus varieties, please contact the Florida Foundation Seed Producers, Inc.

Sugar Belle™ 'LB8-9' (US Patent Pending)
Mandarin Hybrid

Sugar Belle™ ‘LB8-9’ was developed by scientists at the University of Florida’s Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, Citrus Research and Education Center.  Fruit of Sugar Belle™ ‘LB8-9’ resembles that of ‘Minneola’ tangelo in shape, but maturing 4-6 weeks before that of ‘Mineola’, providing Sugar Belle™ ‘LB8-9’ growers and packers with a distinct market advantage, particularly in the holiday season gift market.

The color and flavor of fruit of Sugar Belle™ ‘LB8-9’ equals or exceeds that of ‘Minneola’.  Trees of Sugar Belle™ ‘LB8-9’ are very vigorous and will require horticultural manipulation to control size and cropping.  Another valuable characteristic of Sugar Belle™ ‘LB8-9’ is that its foliage and fruit have much greater tolerance of Alternaria than that of 'Minneola', minimizing fungicide applications.

Taste panels have shown that there is better acceptance of juice from Sugar Belle™ ‘LB8-9’ than that of ‘Minneola’ from fruit stored for 8 weeks.  Panelists have characterized Sugar Belle™ ‘LB8-9’ as having a rich flavor.  Fruit of Sugar Belle™ ‘LB8-9’ had higher Brix (14.2) and acid (1.12) than ‘Minneola’ or ‘Sunburst’, both having a Brix and acid lower than 11.7 and 0.86, respectively.   Particularly, sucrose concentration was higher in Sugar Belle™ ‘LB8-9’ (7.14 g/100ml) than ‘Minneola’ (5.29 g/100ml) or ‘Sunburst’ (6.09 g/100ml).  Vitamin C concentration was 42.43 mg/100ml for Sugar Belle™ ‘LB8-9’ which was considerably higher than ‘Minneola’ (23.27 mg/100ml) or ‘Sunburst’ (26.25 mg/100ml). 

In consumer acceptance studies performed by a commercial polling company in three different U.S. markets, Sugar Belle™ ‘LB8-9’ has been shown to have excellent potential as a new fresh fruit for the consumer.  Sugar Belle™ ‘LB8-9’ fruit were compared with ‘Dancy’ tangerine, ‘Minneola’ tangelo, seedless Spanish Clementine, and two other advanced selections from the UF/IFAS citrus breeding program.  Sugar Belle™ ‘LB8-9’ was selected as the best fruit in overall appearance (7.8 on a 9-point scale), overall flavor (7.0 on a 9-point scale), deemed to be just the right color of fruit and fruit flesh, 73% of the respondents said the acidity was “just right”, 82% the size of the fruit was “just right”, and 56% said they were extremely/very likely to buy this fruit product.

A plant patent application for Sugar Belle™ ‘LB8-9’ has been filed with the United States Patent and Trademark Office.

For more information about this mandarin hybrid, including a description and trial data, please click here.