I've got 2 peach trees. One is around 40 years old which I understand to be unusual. The other is about 15 years old. I have never sprayed either tree and both have produced well every year except 2015. Pruning is a real pain because they produce new growth like crazy. I got over 100 lbs of peaches off of each of them this past year.

Wow, a 40 y/o peach tree! My grandpa planted a 40-acre orchard in 1985, mostly peaches with some other fruit mixed in. The orchard operated about 20 years, and he kept replanting until about then. All of the original peach trees died long ago. The plums, apples, and cherries are still alive. The last trees he planted 20 years ago are still alive, but never make anything.

jmsieglaff, the paint is to confuse and deter. Our trees are in a flood plain, so touch up depends on water messing with the paint. Yours should last 2-3 yrs. Paint up to the branches. When the branches get bigger the borers will go on up, so keep ahead of them with the paint! Lisa, raccoons will take every peach overnight. It's hard to deter them. rockman

My grandfather had a small peach orchard (15-20 trees) as a hobby. Let me tell you it was a lot of work, spraying, pruning, and thinning if you want to get good quality fruit..... but he loved it! He also had some pear trees that produced tons of fruit with little to no work. My advice, if you want to plant it and forget it, go with pear trees.:))

I'll look into pear trees. Pears, like peaches are wonderful with a good specimen, but often meh from the store. Pears would keep longer too. I'm not throwing in the towel on peaches yet--might try a single tree to see how it goes and could add another if the experience with one is favorable.

[QUOTE=jmsieglaff;609104]I'll look into pear trees. Pears, like peaches are wonderful with a good specimen, but often meh from the store. Pears would keep longer too. I'm not throwing in the towel on peaches yet--might try a single tree to see how it goes and could add another if the experience with one is favorable.[/QUOTE]


Don't let these people scare you good things come from hard work.:lol:
It is that bad.
We had great crops.

[url]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uV14jq2n-jg[/url]

Justin, I bud graft my own peaches and nectarines and one of the best for me here has been PF24C, or "flaming fury" peach. I am in zone 5a/b and have not sprayed or done a gosh darned thing to my trees except pick a lot of juicy fruit and a little pruning.
This last year my flaming fury tree bent right over onto the ground with hundreds of peaches but never broke!
I am in a low pest area, so the borers and raccoons and all the other critters aren't that bad. Yet.

If anything peach wood makes good BBQ and smoking wood.

Worth

I'm in zone 5/6 (its 6, but we were 5 just a few short years ago..). I planted 3 peach varieties last year from Adams County Nursery, aiming for a spread out harvest:

Garnet Beauty (Late July)
Redhaven (Early August)
Encore (Early Sept)

Give it a whirl! They grew like crazy this year and I just gave them a heavy pruning this week.