Peach trees and Oriental Fruit moths

[Paddy]

Good day

First I must say peach trees grow so fast and you can see results of your work so quickly. The first growing season we bought 3 trees 2-3 ft tall Red Havens from our local grocery store. The sticks were about 1/2 inch dia. Read up on open center shaping and the fun began.

First year, I recall spraying just once and even managed to get 2 nice large peaches! The trees really built nice scaffolds

Second season. After a good pruning to keep the open center, the trees were covered in blossoms. Due to rain and business travel I missed spraying until well after shuck, maybe 3/8 inch dia fruit. But by then the clear oozing was well in progress. slowly every fruit drop over a one month window. S sad?ang those OFM

Third season, this year. The trees were 9 ft tall/wide with 3 inch dia trunks!, sprayed with horticulture oil early spring,The open center still maintained after pruning. The blossoms were quite thin, max 30-40 on one of the trees. The two other just 10 to 20 blossoms. I値l take what I can. I looked at the blossoms daily so once the petal fall occurred, I could spray. This is where I think I failed. Peaches have a sturdy bud cover, not sure the actual name, but in any case they look like there are petals. but looking closer, I could see tiny fruit, so I sprayed. Sprayed again at shuck, maybe 10 to 14 days later. By the time the peaches were grape size many of them show the darn clear oozing.

I use the Bonide Fruit Tree Spray, with Malathion and Captan. So what is my issue/s; Missed a accurate petal fall by a few days?? Bonide not the best defense against OFM?? Should I have sprayed at bud pink??

Any help for 渡ext year? would be appreciated

Patrick T

 

[Ford850]

It might be the weather, since we've had such a wet spring. I have a small variety of peach trees, and have zero fruit this year. That's probably due to late cold freezes. But still trying to keep a spray routine in case there were a few fruits I might not have seen, and it's been difficult with so many rainy days.

 

[Paddy]

Ford850,

No late freeze here just the Oriental fruit moths. The low bloom rate can be because last year had a very heavy bloom rate?

 

[Ford850]

What about wet weather? I'm afraid the sprays I applied were washed off within hours each time on mine.

 

[DerbyRunner]

Our peach trees do not like to be trimmed annually. Our staff has cut back to every other year.

 

[Paddy]

yes, plenty of rain this year. But that's spring for you.

 

[Paddy]

DerbyRunner,

Do you have a peach orchard? If so, where? Our trees grow very fast. If I didn't prune them I'd lose the "Open Center" shape. My trees are already so tall, I'm trying to keep them under 10 ft tall.

 

[orezok]

I have 2 peach trees both about 5 to 6 years old. Ive kept them to about 7’ high to aid in harvesting. There are so many peaches this year that thinning each tree resulted in a 12 qt bucket from each tree of 1 1/4 peaches. Literally hundreds per tree.

I still will get at least a hundred at final harvest from each tree.

I guess peaches like the desert.

 

[Diggin It]

No way I would apply toxins like that. I let 'em grow as natural as possible. One year I got so many I gave bags or them away, froze as many as I could and still had to let some rot. Next few years, I barely got any at all. Some years we got snow on the blossoms, other years a late freeze. One year they seemed to form well, but never got large or softened. They stayed hard and were bitter as all get out. This year, they seem to be OK so far, but many have dropped to the ground, or have been knocked off by birds.

 

[fruitcakesa]

We have had 2 peach trees in the 33 years we have lived here. The first lasted about 15 years with only regular pruning, no spray of any kind, but succumbed to a heavy wet snow fall that broke it. It gave decent fruit most years.
It was replaced by the current tree of 18 years which usually has good blossoming and sweet juicy fruit; but has had periodic fruit drop over the years.
It is near the end of it's life as these northern hardy peaches do not seem to be long lived like an apple or pear.
I believe they are "Liberty" peach. Semi dwarf.