I believe you are mistaken and underestimate the consequences of generous mulching in the humid region where it breaks down quickly. Cornell did an experiment with wood mulch on apple trees a few years back and by the eighth year the trees started showing excessive vegetative vigor. How much this was the result of water holding capacity and how much the colonization of N fixing bacteria is not known. Here, the soil gets too cool to be optimum below 18" and the warmer and better aerated top 12 is where most of the action is.
My problem is not new to me and I believe it gradually became greater over the years of mulching. On dry seasons it can be a blessing.
A lot of very absorptive roots form under the mulch in the humus layer, so we shall see. I donāt know if my idea will work and wonāt until Iāve tried.
Carolina Gold, my next (and last) overloaded tree has the biggest crop yet. After this, there are only a few more peaches, Carnival and White Heath and neither is remotely overloaded, as they are 2nd year trees. There are also a few Encore, which should be ripe soon.
I went out last night after dark (no waspsā¦) and picked over 30 pounds of peaches. I ran out of cookie trays, but there is still plenty of fruit on the tree.
In addition to the above peaches, I also filled a garbage bag with 18 pounds of rotted peaches and brown rot mummies. Maybe that will help keep the remaining fruit OK for a few more days until I can pick it.
It wasnāt the most fun harvesting experience. I hate to see all the rotted waste- it makes me wish that I was picking jujubes instead, even with the thorns. 1/50 bad ones vs 1/4ā¦And even the bad jujube arenāt that bad. But Iāve got at least a few more weeks before the first of those is ripe.
The load was almost too much for the tree. About 2/3 of the tree is leaning down quite a ways. The neighboring Tam Kam persimmon is acting as an unwilling trellis. Note the kiwi mess in the backgroundā¦
Since the Loring jam turned out well (and much better than White River), Iāll probably make another batch of the damaged Carolina Golds. Iāve also been giving them away to neighbors, but there are still a lot left. Iāve put a couple trays of them in the 2nd fridge downstairs, as in a few weeks I may miss them, with no more peaches coming in.
In the foreground on right is the NJF 16 tree. The green shoot coming up from the large branch is an Elberta bud graft from last summer.
Clemson sells these peach bags. They have a video on how to put the bags on. Itās not easy for someone who does not have good fine motor skills like me but itās not very difficult, either.
The bags come with instructions. They suggest spraying insecticide and fungicide the day before you apply these bags. In my experience, I need to spray that combination 2-3 times starting at shuck split and then 10 days later. Then, if by 2nd spray, the peachlets are not big enough to bag, I spray another time within 10 days. By then, the peaches are a a size that bags can be applied.
After that, no need to worry until peaches ripen. However, if the top of the bags are not tightly closes, OFM or PC could climb in and do damage. Properly applied bags yield great results.
My PF 24 C is loaded, too (thatās why one branches broke) even after a lot of thinning. Because I bagged them all so I can wait until I saw some fell in the bags. I picked 20 yesterday and will pick about that many everyday from now on.
I have several friends wanting to try them. I will try to freeze them, in addition to making jam. May try @joleneakamama peach cake if hubby is willing to bake.
McKay peach. 15.5 brix, firm and juicy. Very good. It reminds me a lot of Contender but a little bit later for me. First year fruiting. My peaches were large but I only had about 10 fruits. I got this from Wallace-Woodstock in Wisconsin, but I donāt see it on their site right now. Mckaynursery.com has it but they only ship to a few northern states. Canāt speak yet about its cold hardiness because all my peach trees had fruit this year. This particular peach dropped and had a tiny amount of bug damage but several are still on the tree.
Manuang, your peaches look beautiful! The whitish stuff on the peaches in the first picture, is it surround? If it is, How easy is it to get rid of it?
I used surround once on my peaches, it stuck on the peach and didnāt come off even after a couple of months. I have to scrub with dish soap every single one before I consume it.
Sarah,
Yes, itās Surround. I bagged my peaches first. When bagging alone did not work (bread bags and organza bags), I added Surround on top of the bags for extra protection. Thus, Surround mostly stuck on the bags, not much on the peaches.
It is not easy to clean Surround off. Most of the time, I peel peaches before I eat so Suuround is not a problem. Even without peeling, I clean peaches and eat them Surround and all.
You spray the surround on top of bag! Thatās much better.
When I sprayed surround directly to the peaches, it cakes on the them. I usually net my peach tree when peach is about to ripen, I didnāt have to that year. Birds wouldnāt touch themš
My method is self preservation. I thought bagging alone would work. It did not. Wherever peaches touch the bags, OFM laid eggs through the bags. I lost quite a few peaches.
To avoid spraying more chemicals, I sprayed Surround. It worked but it doubled the workload. If I could improve my fine motor skills, Clemson bags would be the answer.
The first few harvests, they were very good, with brix in the mid-high teens and lots of flavor. The last couple years Iāve let it over-bear and the flavor suffered. This time is the worst ever, with 8-10 brix. At 10 it is OK. I donāt think the 8ās are worth eating.
I just made a batch of jam out of it and it isnāt bad. I ran out of white sugar, so 1/3 of the sugar is brown. It gave it an interesting color.
It isnāt quite as sweet as the Loring jam, but I like the firmer/chunkier texture. Iām not sure if the brown sugar isnāt quite as sweet, or if the lower brix of the peaches came through. Maybe both. Even so, itās still pretty good.
Thanks, Bob. Same here. Beautiful fruit, sub standard taste. I samples a few and measured brix at 7-8. So far, Iāve been disappointed. I am not picking them early. I picked mostly those that fell in their bags.
I donāt think mine suffered from no thinning issue. The tree was thinned sufficiently. Plenty of summer rain resulted in large fruit (plenty of 9-10 oz) that are so watered down. These many cooler than normal late summer days have not helped, either.
@mrsg47, what a wrong year to have plenty of peaches!!. The last yearās summer drought would have been a perfect peach year. (But we did not have any peaches !!!)
Peach hunting today! A couple years ago I was driving by a nearby home whose mature peach tree was hanging over the back fence. I stopped to pick some up off the ground, and this lady pokes her head up from the other side of the fence and says, āDonāt pick them up from the ground; please pick them from the tree! We hardly use them.ā They let me pick them again this year. This was an answer to prayer, since we only had 4 decent peaches on our tree. Looks like Iāve got lots of processing to do this Labor Day! I only got half the tree, so I could go back if I need more! BTW, due to all the fires, our air quality sucks; hence the mask. It wasnāt because I was a thief, disguising my identity.
