Trees are reactive organisms - everything they do is normal - it's not like they make choices. ;o) Around this time of year, leaf loss in temperate deciduous trees is triggered by the days getting shorter. More accurately it is the increasing length of dark periods, but let's just say it's put into motion by a reduction in photoperiod, which is the amount of sunlight in one day. A chemical called phytochrome "measures' the photoperiod. When day length reaches a certain point, phytochrome 'signals' the tree to start preparing for winter. You could think of this as someone standing next to the tree with a stop watch, keeping track of how long each day was. Wavelengths of red light activate phytochrome and make this process possible - just another example of how light controls many plant life processes. Deciduous trees normally perform one rather obvious task to prepare for winter. They drop their leaves. This is known as abscission. Keep in mind that red light activates phytochrome which, in turn, activates abscission. It all ties back to photoperiod. One of the first stages of abscission involves growing a layer of corky cells where the petiole (stem) of the leaf is attached to the tree. These cells will block the transport tunnels to the leaf so no water or nutrients can get in, and no sugars can get out. As the abscission process develops normally, chlorophyll begins to breakdown and disappear. It will breakdown to where its molecular structure no longer reflects any portion of white light. Chlorophyll is constantly being broken down by sunlight; it can only absorb so much energy before its bonds break apart. During the spring and summer leaves are continually building new chlorophyll molecules, but rebuilding becomes impossible in autumn due to the abscission layer of corky cells. No water or nutrients can get into the leaf to make new chlorophyll. Since all leaves contain carotenoids , we will see shades of yellow and orange once the chlorophyll has broken down. Leaves are always reflecting yellow light, we just can't see it until the reflected green light from the chlorophyll is gone. Abscission also causes anthocyanins to form in some trees. Just before a tree produces the corky cells, many nutrients and sugars in the leaf will move from the leaf to the tree. This is known as translocation. The sugars and chlorophyll (green pigment) remaining in the leaf will break down in a different fashion since the nutrients, especially phosphorus, went into the tree. Anthocyanin pigments result and the leaf will reflect red or purple light. Sorry to be so long winded, but the above is prolly closer to what YOU might think of as 'normal' for this time of year. The abscission of green leaves is likely a signal that something is not culturally pleasing to the tree. There are a number of cultural conditions that can cause green leaves to fall. A sudden cold snap or moving a tree to deep shade could cause it, as could a drought response resulting from over or under-watering, to name a few. Al

cough: 1. If you have already planted 8 peach trees, and are still looking for more, I invite you to consider the following sincerely offered suggestions: a) Make sure you know what is involved in growing 1-3 peach trees before you plant a lot more. Growing peaches is difficult even for experienced backyard growers. Peaches can have a lot of insect and disease problems, and usually do. Do not believe anyone who tells you they are easy to grow "organically". b) Before planting a lot of any one thing, have a plan for the use of the fruit in the event you actually get some production. 2. I have a pretty good-size backyard orchard here, and currently have 5 peach trees. I could actually get by with three good varieties, one early, one late-midseason, and one good peento (flat) type. This year, 3 of the trees produced heavily, a mature Golden Jubilee, a young Contender, and a young (white) Sugar Giant. The Contender ripened extremely early -- July 7, and, since early peaches are not much good for freezing, we had to hustle to eat or give away the more than 50 peaches this tree produced. They are all ripe within a period of a week. The average person, weighing less than 300 lbs., can eat a maximum of 2 large peaches per day. Next to ripen was Sugar Giant, a sweet peach without a lot of flavor. It suffered badly from bacterial spot, and at least half the peaches were thrown out. This peach, a modern variety from the Zaiger program in California, was a mistake to plant here. 3. Because of the 4-day Easter freeze, the Flat Wonderful peento type had only a dozen peaches, but they were truly fine eating, and early to ripen. They have a firm flesh, but wonderful flavor. Because of their odd shape, peento peaches are difficult to cut up and prepare for freezing. The little pit resides right in the middle of the doughnut, and the peach does not split apart like a large freestone. If this tree produces a full crop next season, we will again be shoveling them in shortly after Contender is gone. I would be cautious about planting any of the white peento varieties, which are likely to be far more sensitive to brown rot and other maladies. 4. Golden Jubilee is a late-midseason peach, and this mature (12 year) tree was an abundant producer this year, with about 125 peaches, of which at least 3 dozen weighed one pound or more. My spouse froze 16 quarts of these peaches, which are firm, easy to prepare, and fine for freezing. But we still have a dozen of these peaches in the refrigerator. They ripened the last few days of August and early September. 5. The bottom line here is: I really don't know what we would do with any more peaches. Once you have figured out how to grow them, and protect them against all their enemies, they can be very abundant. After two early sprays with Imidan against plum curculio, and careful thinning, all my peaches were bagged in try-on "footies", which protected them against insects (mainly oriental fruit moth) for the balance of the season. And very effectively - without any further spraying. Footie installation is, however, tedious, and calls for some acquired skill. 6. If you are going to grow peaches, you should become familiar as soon as possible with diseases such as bacterial spot (on the fruit), bacterial canker (on the limbs), and insects like the plum curculio (early) and oriental fruit moth (all season long). After that, you can get some advice here on how to deal with those problems. You should select the varieties to plant very carefully, based on such factors as their ripening times, and resistance to diseases like bacterial spot. Planting what Home Depot happens to have on hand is not the best way to choose your peach varieties. 7. Without considerable effort to learn the essentials of peach growing, you can plant 100 trees and still not get any decent, usable peaches. On the other hand, two or three carefully chosen peach varieties, with the right care, can produce enough peaches to make your family tired of eating peaches, and the neighbors too. Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

I'm pretty sure your peach trees have a nitrogen and or iron, and or magnesium deficiency, and or nematode problem. My "Florida Prince" has leaf yellowing and falling with no signs of fungus. Found enough info on the internet to narrow it down to 4 things things. LOL I applied Southern Ag's calcium nitrate, common magnesium sulfate(Epson salt), Sunniland's nematode control, and ironite. My tree is 3+ years old now and produced over 200 peaches this last season. I was using strips of bicycle inner tube to truss the branches up because it had so many peaches. I live in citrus county Florida. Very hot and humid here during the summer.. I spray with a solution of neem oil weekly to keep any fungus at bay. I hope this helps. Im sure it wont hurt anyways. I'll post results in a month or so.

Squirrels rarely make it to my orchard - too far from the woods for them to venture that far... but if you read back through discussion threads from this forum over the past 20 years... it's a very familiar scenario. The bushy-tailed tree rats have no concept of 'sharing' and don't even bother to wait until the peaches are ripe, and often don't consume the entire fruit - just take a couple of bites and cut another one loose. They WILL take them ALL. What can you do, in anticipation of next year's crop? Start a trapping and termination program right now to start getting the local population under control. Kania traps