Noticed pretty much all my stone fruit have 1.dropped and 2. Have ooze coming out of little holes. Cut open a peach and plum to find worms. Little white ones. What are they and how do I control them next year. All that work of keeping my blooms from freezing was a total waste. This is very disappointing
I only sprayed dormant oil and copper. Last year i had what someone here identified as twig borers but no sign of that yet. Between late freezes, bugs, squirrels and the birds Iām starting to feel the stress isnāt worth it. Thankfully there is a large commercial peach orchard only 45 minutes away from me.
Mk,
Peaches have several pest, plum curculio, oriental fruit moth, coddling moth, stink bugs, etc. Dormant oil and copper are not for these pests.
For these pests, you needs to spray at shuck split and every 10-14 days after that depending on how much pest pressure you have. PC has about two generations. Oriental fruit moth can have up to 4-5 generation in one growing season.
You can try more organic method by using Surround as protectant among other things. Just check a search function on Low Impact Spray on this forum.
At times, I donāt think peaches are worth it, but only at times .
Thanks for the info. You know the ironic thing in all this is I grow many different citrus and short of a little spider mite pressure I donāt have spray them for anything. Overwintering them here is far easier than keeping up with all that is required of the fruits that actually are supposed to grow here.
I donāt have a picture of the pest, since Iāve never seen it, but it eats small, shallow holes into new fruits, preferably pears. Not much more than skin-deep, between 1/8 - 1/4" in diameter.
Reading your post and sensing your frustration really hit home with me. I remember so well doing exactly what you did- working extremely hard to protect blooms only to have those little worms ruin every single last peach on my first 2 peach trees. I just want to encourage you not to give up. As a beginner with 1% of the knowledge many people have, Iāve still been able to overcome the challenges and it looks like I may have a good harvest of peaches this year (not to count chickens before they hatch). So hang in there. You can start next year using the sprays recommended by people on here (often its triazicide, which you can buy at Lowes and walmart). Youāll figure it out and when you do, youāll realize that it honestly isnāt that big a deal - especially with just a few trees- to just walk and put some spray on every couple weeks or so. Trust me, there is nothing like the satisfaction you will get when you realized that you have ādefeatedā your main challengers/pests and grown your own incredible fruit. Donāt give up!!!
Thanks for that cityman. I know it will get easier as I figure out just what and when I need to do things. Funny thing is I have Triazicide. I got it to spray for the twig borers but they havenāt shown up. I wasnt thinking about plum curculio because Iāve never had fruit for them to eat.
If I can say one good thing about this itās that now I donāt have to mess with or worry about protecting from birds and squirrels. Although there might be a hand full of plums out there that could still make it. Also my citrus are having a bumper crop this year. We donāt have any pest pressure here for them so thatās is good.
Trust me, few people have made more mistakes than me, and even fewer have had problems as bad as mine that were beyond their control (my neighbor let his weed killer drift onto my orchard and killed almost 20 trees, damaged more, and caused total loss of fruit for the year). But please trust and believe me when I say that in spite of (and perhaps in part because of) how challenging it can be, fruit growing can be the most rewarding, fun, and exciting hobbies youāve ever had. Some may scoff at the use of the word āexcitingā for something that takes 4 years or so to happen, but those people have never looked in a tree and seen their first ripe cherry that eveyone told them would never be possible! Or seen the look on a childās (or family or friendās) face when you give them a real, orchard ripened piece of fruit and wait for their reaction when they taste it! Or most of all, excitement is when you yourself pick that first piece of fruit youāve waited 4 years for and watched all season long, then you taste it and its one of the few things in life that actually DOES live up to the high expectations youāve had.
Anyway, these are just a few of the reasons I wanted to encourage you to hang in there- it IS worth it. And btw, you really have discovered part of the bright side of loosing your fruit - not having to continue to fight animals and insects. Another advantage is that your trees can put a lot more of their energy resources into the tree itself so it will be considerably bigger and stronger next year.
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