I usually did it around March, sometimes early April. But to do dormant spray after pruning I prefer to do it earlier. Can I do it on Saturday?. But some rain expected on Sunday… And Saturday may be too breezy for spraying, but I a least can get pruning done. Here is the weather for weekend and next week, would you do it in this weather? Any other considerations other than weather?
I will prune on a sunny day (s) in feb. then spray😍
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In thought peach trees were supposed to be pruned after they bud out.
I always pruned mine in the early spring just before the flowers opened. We bring in a bunch of the cuttings and put them in a vase of water to watch them bloom.
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The video I learned from said early April but while still dormant, so i don’t know 
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What are you doing a dormant spray for now- you still have plenty of time for copper and it is probably better done later anyway. You don’t need to spray after pruning unless you have an existing canker problem and for that it is advised to prune after trees break dormancy so you might be best served to use a copper soap that won’t hurt leaves after pruning just before bloom. I even use the soap to prevent peach leaf curl effectively (but must be applied just before bud break or the preceding fall to treat that).
I have lost peach trees by pruning too early because of an unforecasted sudden drop in temps to near zeroF immediately after pruning. Surviving trees suffered a lot of cambium damage to trunks. Before that I had gotten away with Feb. pruning of peaches in Z6 for many years, although most of my peach pruning has always been done in March. I’m too busy in April to do it any other way except for my own trees.
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Thanks, spraying after pruning is just for spraying less wood . I am going to do a lot of pruning this year, about 1/3 of the tree, just wanted to save some spray and time. I need to spray copper before the bud break for curly leaf disease - last year I sprayed too late due to crazy spring weather and still had the CL. Not as much as year before but still. I want to nail it this year. I guess I will wait for March than.
I prune in mid-April after the danger of extreme low temps (< 30 degrees) has passed.
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I agree with the comments posted. Pruning does reduce winter hardiness. I’ve read conflicting info. about how long after pruning the effect lasts. Some researchers say pruning affects hardiness for a couple weeks, others say it can last for months.
Like other’s have mentioned, I would at least wait till you’re sure the coldest part of the winter is past.
Pruning just before or during bloom will make the blooms more susc. to frost damage. I’ve read this and seen it first hand, so I don’t prune close to bloom anymore.
What I don’t know is how early one can prune before bloom and not make blooms more susc. to frost damage. I’ve not seen any research on this. In other words, can one get away with pruning 4 weeks before bloom and still avoid making flowers more frost tender? 3 weeks? 2 weeks?
I don’t know the answer to those questions. Pruning before bloom will speed flower bud development, which can be a negative in areas, where frost is a concern. It’s for those reasons I’ve quit pruning peaches from about Dec. to April. I’m not at all saying pruning peaches in Feb. or March is necessarily a bad thing (a lot of people do it) just that I’m not convinced there aren’t some risks pruning during that time in my area.
I try to make it at least once through the trees (pruning) in the summer, then I give them a good pruning starting around Oct. and quit pruning by Dec. Supposedly pruning too early in the fall can delay dormancy, so there is some risk there too. Labor availability to some extent drives the timing on my pruning, but if labor wasn’t a consideration, I’d probably dormant prune just after most the leaves fall.
Some other commercial growers here prune peaches all winter long. Again, not because there aren’t risks to the trees in pruning all winter, but because of labor availability.
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It depends a lot on location. For me as of about March 1 the temps are very unlikely to go below 15F or so and pruning can commence. I have pruned midwinter some years and its not a whole lot different, I may lose a bit of wood here and there. I generally do check to make sure its not going to drop into the single digits in the next week or so.
In a colder zone its much more tricky.
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I haven’t noticed pruning accelerating flowering but I assume you got a good comparison at a same site- you grow so many more peaches at one site than I do - my trees are spread out in 100 orchards. I’m going to test your theory this year on some nursery trees. If you are correct, the best time to prune should be at bloom, which is often when I prune the peaches in my orchard. Never saved a crop by doing that as far as I know, though.
I have observed (and read) pruning at bloom makes blooms more frost susc. but I’ve only read (not observed) that pruning before bloom will speed flower bud development. My varieties bloom at all different times, and I haven’t paid that much attention on how pruning may affect the timing of first bloom. I’ve read that pruning will speed flower bud development, but can’t remember where. I googled and this came up, but I’ve read it other places.
“Based on observing peach trees that were approaching bloom, I think that in some years pruned trees begin to bloom and leaf out a little earlier than trees that were not yet pruned.”
https://extension.psu.edu/cold-hardiness-of-fruit-trees
Again, like losing hardiness of flowers from pruning, I have no idea what timing is involved which would show these effects. Would pruning two months ahead of bloom, advance bloom? One month ahead of bloom? I don’t know. If you get a chance to test it with some trees, please let me know what you find out.
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I do believe that pruning can accelerate flower bud development on Peaches and Blueberries, but I’m not sure if I have actually seen it. When I asked the same question to the fruit doctors they both indicated that they did not believe it was possible to delay bloom by delaying the pruning.
I still prune my Blueberries as late as possible. They prune a lot faster then Peaches so I wait as long as possible and prune them last. The Blackberries get pruned first.
This year I plan to do most of the detail pruning on the Peaches after I see how much fruit set I get. It would be real fast with a battery powered pruner on a 3 foot stick!
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I remember seeing a cartoon drawing ( like Fedco uses) either on a nursery site or in their catalog about this pruning issue with peaches. They had a " Don’t forget" then the quote. Their pruning information said something to the fact " Peaches are the only fruit that you prune after…" then my mind goes blank. I thought I would remember something like THAT. I’m going through the sites I can remember to see if I can find it again.
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