Our Peach Tree

Our peach tree (“Reliance”) is now 4 years old and needed fairly severe pruning. Every expert I have talked to and every article I have read concerning peach tree maintenance have recommended this step. So, I did. Apparently I have done a good job by trimming about 1/3 of smaller branches and all the vertical suckers. In few weeks time the tree was absolutely covered in pink flowers.



Then, when leaves came out 2 weeks later they immediately started to curl, got brittle and the ones I didn’t remove fell off. The tree got leaf curl, fungus that is dormant in wood over winter and strikes in the spring.





There is a spray on the market and I have it but we had such a lousy fall that I just couldn’t do it. I needed dry period of 2 days and windless weather. There was not a single day that I could have sprayed. Anyway, new wood started to grow and with it new leaves but the fruits started to fall off just after forming and kept falling off till about end of July. We had 36 peaches left to mature.



Last year the tree was so heavy with fruit that I had to support 4 branches with 2X2 lumber to prevent the limb from splitting. We had at least 200 pounds of fruit from that tree and were giving it away by buckets. Many branches were permanently bent because of the weight.





Fruit trees are fun to have but, boy, do they ever require TLC! This fall I will be spraying for sure. And next spring I will have to prune again because all the wood grew back, tree’s revenge, I guess.

One of 36 survivors.

Peach Tree Got Some Serious Trim

After procrastinating for last 2 years I have finely pruned our super productive Peach Reliance (Prunus persica). What a job it was! It is not the physical aspect of it but deciding what to cut and how far to cut. In the beginning I took it slowly; you can always cut more but once it is cut, that’s it. In the end we liked the result. I figured that the wood I cut would have produced at least a bushel of peaches. The loss of peaches for this season doesn’t bother me since we gave most of the fruits to our neighbors anyway. I am just anxious to see what the tree will look like once the leaves are out. Now I have to find out how to heal the cut wood of one branch that is a bit rugged and slightly split. I don’t want any disease to get into the wood and possible kill the branch or even the whole tree. It is high time to get some advice from Garden Web.

Is it time to prune a peach tree in 6a zone?

This is a copy of a message I have posted on Fruit and Orchard Forum on GardenWeb.

We still have a lot of snow on ground but I don’t want to mess up with pruning and spraying this year. Can somebody help me and tell me how much and where to prune? I know that all branches that cross each other should be pruned but how much and what else? I will post pictures on my blog.

Last year I couldn’t spray because if it wasn’t windy it was raining. Still, I had an excellent crop despite leaf curl. I need help with downsizing that tree!  

Where and how much to prune?

The Peach Tree

It looks like I will have to focus my attention on our peach tree. We bought our Peach Reliance (it can tolerate -30°C) 4 years ago and brought it home in a trunk of our Toyota Avalon and now it is about 12 feet tall. Last season it gave us at least 250 super succulent and sweet peaches. Very soon I will have to prune the branches and then spray with copper and insecticidal soaps, something that I just couldn’t do last spring. If it wasn’t raining it was very windy and because I couldn't spray I have paid for it with lots of curled leaf damage. However, the tree recovered quite nicely. I hate to cut the branches and loose all the fruit but it is basic maintenance that I just have to learn to be comfortable with.

After the peach tree I will slowly focus on starting peppers, tomatoes, Japanese eggplants, basil, etc. Two years ago I have build a cold frame so I could have an early. It can be seen at the end (1’: 25sec.) of my movie on this post.

Spring is just around the corner!

Memory of Summer.