If you look at this post: Peaches 2026 - #85 by benthegirl I have linked one of my favorite fruit pruning videos. It is @Olpea pruning and choosing scaffolds on a 1.5 year old peach tree. He takes off a TON which gave me a lot more confidence when pruning my young peach trees- the explanation is also very good about why he is choosing what he does. I haven’t managed to kill any young peach trees by pruning!
Here is a picture of the buds on a shoot that developed this year. Research has shown that the number of flower buds is usually set by late June/early July in peaches and is about the amount of light they get on the branches before then. Good news - peaches often overset fruit and you usually need to thin. I’ve found they’re either overset or 0. I’ve read various things and tried to thin to one peach per 8" or so of branch (when they actually manage to set fruit!).
I pasted a picture of one of my peaches below. Just to show the leaf and flower buds. The ones that are 3 little buds are often flower, leaf, flower - I circled one in pink. The singles can be leaf or flower - usually seem to be leaf on certain trees and flower on others. Sometimes you can tell by how swollen they are. I circled two in orange.
