I'm thinking of planting a RELIANCE peach tree in my backyard. This type of peach tree is very cold hardy. I live in southern ontario(toronto) I have 2 apple trees in my yard so I would like to plant something else for variety. Alot of people tell me that peach is very sensitive and suseptible to diseases. So I would like to get some advice from members on here... thanks
Peach tree borer was my nemesis....the grubs pleasantly coexisted with my plums (so nicely that I didn't know they were there) until the peach came to town. It was clearly more popular than the plums and lost the battle over 3 years.
Damn... probably better to go with a pear/apple tree. With those varieties you only need to worry about fire blight.
How do you take care of borers? I saw a peach tree today at the nursery...looked pretty good. Hard to resist planting one of my very own. How was the frost in your area...any damage to the tree while it was alive?
I don't think borers are a problem all the time? Just unfortunate luck in my case. No worries about late frosts in Kingston....the Lake slows things down in spring then provides a buffer against late spring frosts. There is a large peach/nectarine/apricot (can't get close enough to tell) just down the street from me. It flowers at about the same frequency as the Wisteria around here...Not every year but often enough to keep it around.
I had planted Reliance last year around mid June. It survived the its first winter in Zone 5 in Ottawa. I added "Early Red Haven" peach tree a week ago. I hope the borers and other killers stay away. How long, on the average, it takes to fruiting of Peach tree.
I will use nematodes around the lawn area to kill any potential borers. Did you put stakes in the ground to burlap the peach from the winter wind or did you leave it bear?
I did not cover the Reliance for winter protection but I did mulch it with 6" pile of leaves at least for the first winter. It leaf'd in the third week of April with abundant leaves. It survived in Ottawa so it should definitely survive in areas milder than Toronto. It is still unknown if it will bloom and then bear fruit and if the squirrel will share some with us. They are horribly nasty.
I'm confused by this...you mean "milder like Toronto" right? My reliance is just begining to flower...I planted it last week.
Yes, milder like Toronto, Kingston, Hamilton etc. Yours is flowering because it has been out of dormancy for a while at the garden centre.
