Peach-tree Borers!

You do not need a license to spray Triaz.

This would explain why my Harko Nec hasn’t been growing much at all. I just bought it 2-3 years ago. I cleaned all the gunk out and saw some tiny borers. Half of the base is eaten away. Can this be saved? I’ll try the raw Neem now, but wondering if it’s worth it.

Here’s a better shot to show of much is eaten…

It might pull through and re-establish itself just fine.

@alan has mentioned having witnessed the strong vigor of peaches allowing them to outgrow such abuse.

Get the neem and the clothes-hanger wires out. Keep a watch on the base of your trees.

2 Likes

It will probably heal if you don’t let it crop this year. I’ve seen worse and never lose them if I catch it before the tree is completely girdled. I do use Lorsban, however. But if the poison kills them, it will work. You just will have to reapply more.

Make sure the tree suffers no environmental stress this growing season, especially drought. And nitrogen is always helpful- in any available form.

3 Likes

Thats just a little borer-scratch! I have had trees much worse. If they are almost completely girdled they can take 2-3 years to come back but they should eventually.

2 Likes

Do you do more than one treatment with the neem oil?

When things are worse I have been doing multiple treatments. I recently made the mistake of not doing any treatment for a year, bad idea. So, I treated in mid-winter and am going to treat again when they start to come up for air.

I was reading an interesting old pamphlet on borer control that mentioned the time of emergence varies a lot based on geography. Its an important thing to know as that is the time to focus on, there is only a month or two when they are not in the wood. For my area it is in May-June. Surprisingly it is often later further south, it seems to be related to how many months before it will get cold and that time is later in the south. The reasoning is the borer wants to get as fat as possible eating on wood before pupating.

5 Likes

I need to remember to spray the base of peaches thoroughly when doing spring spraying for PC, etc. I tend to focus on the canopy. The stuff I’m spraying then is softer than Lorsban, but would probably be enough to clear up most of the problem.

1 Like

Thanks

I would try an insecticide!

1 Like

I put the Neem and insecticide on it and it’s definitely not dead.

1 Like

I just noticed that one of my peach trees looks about the same as yours, I did spray neem oil about a month ago but I will try it again, Also I didn’t see any borers but I did find a small black insect about 3/8 inches long, It looks like a worm, can’t take a picture right now as I can’t find the camera.

I am trying a new borer treatment:

The raw neem is expensive so I am trying a mix of 5-1 water to neem with a little soap to get the neem to dissolve. I also added a bunch of Surround to make it almost a paste. Then I glopped around each tree. I am hoping the Surround provides added annoyance for the borers.

Right now is emergence for me, that is the key time to treat things. I caught a few in my borer traps.

I really learned the hard way that you can’t let up on treatment, I skipped one year and then used Tanglefoot the next year … big mistake! Also the timing is really important, emergence is when you need to treat since when they are deep in the wood they are much harder to treat.

4 Likes

Lookslike plaster!

Lorsban is almost idiot proof- and I’m just the man to prove it.

It sucks that when a pesticide is deemed bad for overall canopy spraying a different standard is not applied to spot spraying. It is a world of difference. I wish I could purchase Lorsban in small packaging because I use so little of it to protect 100’s of trees. 4 ounces would probably last me at least 2 years.

2 Likes

I’m getting worried about borers getting into my plum rootstock which appears to be Lovell. The trees are going into the third leaf. Do you think they are durable enough at this age to handle painting the lower trunk with just neem oil?

I hate it when the west coast nurseries use peach for apricots. I have Tomcots on that and I forget to keep my eyes on them because the rest of the varieties I manage are not on susceptible rootstock.

2 Likes

I have Robada on peach…think its lovell…been a borer magnet.

I also have problems with plums or apricots on peach roots, until I remembered they were on peach those trees were getting nailed by borers.

I think 3rd leaf is fine personally, I did some 2nd leaf trees today. I have never had any problems at all on any age peach tree including baby seedlings, but someone had a problem on an apple.

BTW I would look up when the borers emerge for you, its a bit of a paradox that further south they emerge later - they are timing it by how far from the cool fall it is, a certain amount of time is needed but otherwise they would prefer to grow ever fatter in the spring and early summer. I trapped three borers in two days so I didn’t get them all with early neem and digging-out.

1 Like