Third year contender peach with lots of winter die back on the branches

General Fruit Growing
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Hello. My third year planted peach tree suffered this winter. Here in South Dakota we had a pretty tough winter and lots of things had a lot of die back on the branches. The roses had a lot of die back but the peach tree I’m not sure what to do about it. Looking forward to your comments thank you.

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I am impressed that you are willing to grow peaches in zone 4.

I think your chance of getting fruit buds to survive each winter will be slim.

Your tree is still young. Pruning those died back branches off, shape your trees. Then, feed the tree with high nitrogen to stimulate new growth would be what I would if it were my tree.

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@DakotaGarden

Contender and reliance are about as tough as you can get for your zone. We grow them both here in zone 6a but have not had die back. We get peaches 90% of the time. I’m not a peach grower really i just grow a few trees for pies etc. Once you remove the dead branches you should be fine. Normally i prune peaches only after they wake up.

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I am near you in MN. My contender had a decent amount of die back as well, but I still got a few peaches (although many less than last summer’s bumper crop). Did you get fruit last year? I feel like these peach trees may turn biennial.

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I hear that Siberian C is the most cold hardy peach. I think fruitwood nursery might have it some times.

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My Contender and my Redhaven peach trees looked dead until about three weeks ago. I am not sure what the heck happened. I have three peaches total on all three peach trees I have. A wasted season. The branches really died back and look horrible.

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I’m in zone 4 as well and my Veteran peach made it through the its first winter but lost a lot of branches as well. The two branches that survived are putting out a lot of growth now though, even set 2 peaches which I removed. I didn’t want to remove them as any winter could be its last, but I’m an optimist.

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Thank you. I pruned it and will feed it. It looks pretty now.

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Years ago i had a reliance peach and got 22 beautiful peaches one year…then we had a terrible hail storm that beat it terribly. I pulled the tree out. Now maybe i think i should have waited but every inch of it was battered…

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We can hope for next year.

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No fruit at all. It has only seen 2 winters in our garden.

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This winter should be milder. I’m with you. It takes optimism to be a gardener

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