Peach spray Dazed and Confused

13 years ago

Tomorrow looks like the first possible break in the weather to spray my peach trees. Still in dormant stage, but showing a little bud swell after the 80 degree day we had a few days ago. I have read everything that I can get my hands on, including this forum, on what to spray at this point. Frankly, I'm suffering from information overload and need some simple and direct answers. I hope that you can help me out. The trees are 3 years old. The only problem that I'm aware of was OFM last year. the trees are healthy and growing well.

Lime Sulfur? Daconil? Copper? Hort Oil (Seasonal)? If I use Lime Sulfur, or any of the fungicides, can I mix with the Hort. oil or wait for a couple of weeks to use the oil?

At this point I'm leaning toward spraying lime sulfur and following with Hort. Oil in a couple of weeks or maybe sooner depending on the weather. I sure appreciate all of the help that I get from everyone here. Thanks, luke

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Comments (5)

Scott F Smith
13 years ago
Luke, L/S and oil is fine to mix for dormant spray. I don't frankly know how important oil is for peaches, the main reason for dormant oil is for its effect on mites and scale. I have had some problems with peach white scale so I have needed oil, but that scale is not so common. Later on in the season the oil can smother any OFM eggs on the trees, but I don't think it helps in dormant season since any moths on the tree bark are pupae and most are probably on the ground anyway. But if you have the oil it certainly won't hurt to throw it in with the L/S.

If you get problems with bacterial spot in future years you may need to switch to copper from L/S but at this point L/S is fine. I have beaten my bacterial spot back to nearly nothing and may switch back to L/S next year. A dormant spray of copper or L/S is very important in my mind, there are many bad peach diseases and its reduces the initial populations which helps you all year long.

Scott
olpea
13 years ago
I'll answer your question from my locale. While I'm sure our climates and pest pressures are not identical, at least we're on the same side of the continent.

Here, I haven't experienced any real need to spray peach trees w/ dormant oil. While there are a multitude of crawlers which can affect peach trees (scale, green peach aphid, etc.) they don't seem to be a problem for me. The only time I spray oil on peach trees is if there is some left over in the sprayer (from spraying apples and pears). Sometimes I also use a little oil as a sticker on peaches.

I don't use lime sulfur. It's popular w/ folks trying to do things organic, but it has lower efficacy than synthetic counterparts, so I don't mess with it.

Leaf curl is a problem here, so I use copper or the more effective chlorothalonil (aka Daconil) in the dormant season.

The two big insect problems w/ peaches are OFM and plum curc. If you don't have to deal w/ plum curc., that's great.

Here OFM starts after shuck-split but doesn't really get rolling till summer. How often you have to spray for it depends on your local pest pressure and how much fruit loss you're willing to tolerate.

Brown rot is the other big destroyer of peaches. A good fungicide the last 30 days before harvest will help you a lot there.
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Olpea, this fungal vs bacterial shot-hole is a complex issue. My belief is that both varieties are common in the east (and, I have been told this by some experts). However, people seem to only talk about the bacterial kind and it is the only thing listed in spray guides. So, my feeling is they are sloppily viewed as one disease in the east, and this greatly confuses the treatment recommendations. I am almost positive that I have the fungal form in my orchard since the holes tend to be more round-edged with that. I think I have some of the bacterial version as well but am not completely sure. In terms of overall spray recommendation I follow the west coast idea of a leaf fall spray for fungal spot but which east coast people do not mention, but I believe the repeated spring sprays of the east coast guides are good for either kind of shot-hole since rain events are horrible for either of them -- my round-holed shothole propagates like crazy onto the new leaves after a rain, and if there is no rain the new leaves stay clean. The west coast recommendations for fungal spot are not taking into account heavy spring rains since they don't have them. I am guilty of abusing this terminology myself since its a pain to go into a lengthy explanation each time, but most of the time the treatment is similar so I don't feel too bad about it. However you are correct that fungonil is only useful for the fungal kind. LL, I don't see any problem with that mix. Scott
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Drew, armchair theories may add color to this forum, but from a practical standpoint often seem like poor advice from my perspective. These are not theories in the scientific definition of the word and are not even backed by anecdote that you are sharing. I think the validity of your hypothesis depends on the disease being capable of establishing in the wood itself and then spreading throughout the tree through the vascular system. I really can't think of a single pest that once established on a site tends to become harder to control to the point where you want to keep trees protected throughout the growing season so they never suffer any infection from it. With brown rot, you do want to avoid having the fungus grow into the small wood if you can help it by removing infected fruit promptly but brown rot is universal so you can't keep it from establishing in your orchard- just in the small wood. Integrated pest management of plants involves using as little proactive spray as practical. Your fears of fighting pests by keeping compounds on the trees represents the old fashioned approach. Your comparison of lung cancer and smoking seems pretty pointless and is irrelevant to plant care, in my opinion. Aren't you really just talking about your experience with canker on your cherry trees? You may eventually find out the problem there had more to do with environmental problems than a failure of early enough treatment. Cherries in a humid climate need full sun, or at least full eastern exposure, good drainage and everything else required for vigorous growth. That isn't to say that there aren't sites where proactive protection of cherry trees from canker isn't necessary. I'm just guessing here because you provided no examples to illustrate your theory that actually involves fruit trees.
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Its impossible to know what a good spray schedule would be for you as we don't know your area. Otherwise it sounds like you are more or less taking care of business. P.S. Thin fruit sooner rather than later, and be aggressive. You won't regret it.
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Olpea - thanks for the link. It's interesting. I bookmarked it for future reference Fruitnut - thanks for the correction. I often get them confused. I'll try leaving some peaches without protection next year to see what I get. The leaves look good. With description Scott mentioned (in the old post) re. what to look for, and the picked on Olpea's link, I think it's more like scab. For all I know, I could have both!!!
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olpea
13 years ago
Scott, didn't see your post till after I submitted.

Looks like we were saying the same thing, the exception being the lime sulfur.
alan haigh
13 years ago
Speaking from another region- not quite coastal southeastern NY, stink and tarnished plant bugs are much more of an issue on peaches than OFM. Even plum curculio is more of an issue on plums, apples and nectarines than peaches.

Maybe I do get an occasional OFM worm in a peach but mostly it's the flagging of shoots that can be an OFM induced problem when growing young peach trees. On many sites where landscapes are more manicured I never even see any flagging shoots in spite of no insecticide after May.

To find out what you really need on your site you actually have to risk some fruit. With the right fungicide like Monterey Fungus Killer you can rescue fruit if it begins to rot and than get an idea of what is actually necessary long term. I have sites that have mature peach trees, even later bearing ones, that have never needed a single brown rot spray.
luke_oh
Original Author
13 years ago
Daconil it was. Turned out to be a great day here with 2 more to follow. At least that's the forecast, we know how that goes. Thanks for your help. luke

Peach spray Dazed and Confused

Comments (5)

Scott F Smith

olpea

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Peach spray Dazed and Confused

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Scott F Smith

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