Thanks for the info fruitnut,jellyman. I did take the garbage bags off first thing in the am before sun came up, as I thought about the leaves/trees cooking. The news here says that 90% of the peach crop in south carolina is gone. I don't know what else I could have done, as the 10-20mph winds during the cold snap here, would and did prevent any heat sources near trees from keeping the air warm. I am watching the 4 peach trees to see if in next month leaves come back, and I will be careful not to overwater them. I pour 5 gallons of water each week on each tree, includes the cheeries and apples. As I said before the apples and cheeries are fine, as jellyman pointed out, I would have been better just to have not done anything, and not used the garbage bags. Thanks for all the info.

Your neighbors and other growers of fig trees in your climate zone can expect their trees to freeze to the ground and then re-sprout ....maybe...each year. In colder climates, fig trees do not do well unless extraordinary precautions are taken to protect the wood and roots from damages due to sub-freezing temperatures. Wrapping trees will not protect the roots in really bad years. Many growers dig a deep trench and bent the trees sideways, and bury the fig trees under 1 foot of soil/sand, and then heavily mulch. Last winter the weather was so freezing cold, and for so long, that many growers lost their trees. At best, the trees froze to the ground and re-sprouted new stems from the roots. If this happens on a regular schedule, you are essentially growing just rooted cuttings, and your trees will have to expend tremendous amounts of reserved energy just to regrow what was killed off by the cold temps. The figs that may form will form late in the season and may, or may not have time to ripen. Growing trees planted in the ground in colder climates is a crap shoot. You may get away with your trees escaping damages for a number of years...if, the winters are mild...but all it takes is just one bad winter to wipe out your trees. Then you can start over. The younger the trees, the more susceptible to winter damages, but even older, established trees can be killed or badly damaged. Thousands of fig trees in and around NYC were killed. Those that survived are now re-growing complete new canopies. NYC is zone-7, but temps. rarely go into the single digits. Most years, the winter temps. are in the high 20s to mid 30s, or higher. Yet, for years, in ground trees were never damaged. Some NYC fig trees had trunks 5"-8" in diameter. Now, they are dead. Zone-6 is considerably worse than NYC. Frank

15" depth was likely too deep. Your present planting sounds good. Would have preferred loosening the soil out to five times the container diameter with that drainage. I would have confirmed the root crown was at the top of the container soil before digging. I would have just used native soil adding finished compost only to replace the discarded grass volume that you removed. Any amendments to the soil must be homogeneously mixed into the soil or water impermeable layers will form. 1.5 days to drain is too long. I would classify that (>24 hours) as a drainage problem. Most likely the water you kept applying to the old tree was just piling (layering) up and going anaerobic. I would consider drilling/digging a hole down nearby to punch through any layers of soil. 4 feet deep would be ideal but sometimes it is hard to do much beyond 3 feet deep. People refill with all sorts of stuff. I am not convinced that any is any better than simply refilling the hole with the material removed having broken through the layers (compressed, clay, caliche). With flood irrigation I assume the soil has been compressed by heavy equipment while the soil was wet at some time in the past. It is unusual for flood irrigated soil to not be well draining. Mound or raised bed planting is an alternative. With flood irrigation on a new tree, I would water once in between. Soak long enough to hit 3 feet down. But here is the strategy. New in ground. Water every day for 3 days. This is to collapse any air pockets in hole. Replace any collapsed pockets around hole with more soil. Then stop until it needs more moisture. In a fall planting (from container) this will be infrequent. Your flood irrigation should keep up. Maybe in a hot/dry Sept or even Oct. I might water once in between irrigations. For a new tree, I like to put 5 gal right around the roots for the first few weeks. I use a cheap Home Depot type bucket with a couple of 1/64th" (?) holes in them that allow the buckets to drip out fast enough to not pool up on the surface. Then I double up with a similar watering on the other side. That can last from 8-12 weeks post planting. By then I assume the roots are established and start with the watering schedule found in the bottom link below. Hopefully the canopy reflects this. With flood irrigation adjust watering accordingly. There are differences between containers in Sept/Oct and bareroots in Jan/Feb. And flood irrigated property versus basin irrigation. I never stake trees without a reason and I've never had a reason on a newly planted tree. I paint mine but truthfully on peaches it likely makes no difference as their bark handles the sun pretty well. Though paint and keeping it painted as it expands may prevent borers overwintering their eggs down low in the trunk bark. http://wateruseitwisely.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/az1022.pdf http://wateruseitwisely.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/Landscape-Watering-Guide.pdf

You tend to notice things when you are short and the plant is taller than you are which is the way I first saw it several years ago. I then started looking at other peonies to see if they did the same thing. This year I am seeing some of what would be next years buds unfurling leaves. Not that usual and the few times I have seen this unfurling the new stems withered in the heat of the summer. Followed by fewer flowers the next year.