I have a three year old peach tree planted in zone 4 in Wisconsin. It was supposed to be hardy for my zone. It has branches on it every year that grow, but no leaves on the branches. There are always beautiful new shoots of leaves coming out of the ground from the plant, but nothing on the branches. I trimmed it back this year, but do not know what else to do. Can anyone help? Should I be covering it in the winter and if so, with what and for how long?
I live in zone 4b 5a and tried 2 peach trees 3 years ago(not sure of variety, bought at a big box store), the first summer they grew like weeds and in the fall the leaves stayed green even after many below freezing days.The leaves never changed color, they only fell off after being frozen in 20F (-10c) and high winds. That winter it got down to -20F(-28c) in the spring one tree leafed out a little then died, the other most of the new growth died back to the trunk but quickly bounced back and had about 4 feet of new grow that summer, in the fall again looked like it would stay ever green. Last winter went down to a record low -22F(-32c) this spring it had one little green shoot about 6 feet high on the trunk. It quickly shriveled up and the tree was dead! I used no fertilizer and eased up on the watering in late summer to try and get it to go dormant but nothing worked. It looked as if the scion and rootstock had trouble communicating with one another or something. Unlike your tree my rootstock died with the scion. I have 9 surviving peach saplings that took 2 years to germinate. I started out with 12 but the cat dug one up last summer when it was small, one didn't make it through winter and the others were girdled by my neighbors rabbits down to the ground and never came back.Actually all of them were a little munched on by deer and my neighbors rabbits but they pulled through and are now currently about 3 feet tall in their second growing season. I did nothing to protect them for the winter, the wood matured and hardened off then the leaves turned yellow with all the rest of the trees in the fall . Were do you have your tree planted? Is it protected from the wind and sun in the winter? I planted mine in an open area with no protection, I think the worst was the sun in winter it just seemed to dry it out. I've noticed a few peach trees in the city with shelter from houses that pulled through last winter with very little die back. My suggestion to you if you want to try another peach is to try and plant in a protected area shaded from the low angled winter sun, or paint as much of the trunk as you can with white latex paint in the fall.
Thank you so much for your input. It is out in the open with no protection. The paint won't hurt it? Should I cover it in the winter with something?
