Freej, I thought I hit upon that above: if many fruits have no observable bug entry point or damage when cut open but still are rotting, you have brown rot. It could have been that rains washed away your sulphur too soon. Next spring use a sticker along with the sulphur, it will help it stay attached better. I always use Nufilm 17 with my sulphur sprays. Also re-apply after a major rain. The regular interval spray schedule method is imperfect, you also need to take into account the weather and past pressure (which sounds pretty fierce for you in this case). If you spray one day and there is a huge downpour all the next day, you are pretty much down to zero protection until your next spray, and if that is two weeks away you have just opened up a big window for diseases to enter. If I were you I would switch to copper pre-bloom since it is more effective than sulphur. This is war. Fight harder, fight longer, fight smarter, fight with bigger weapons. You should be able to beat it. Scott

Olpea, I used to get it from Hilltop but stopped ordering when they drastically reduced selection. You'd probably need to find a grower that orders from them in your area if they still propagate it- assuming you don't need 100 trees. I think Raintree might carry it- I've seen it at one of those retail companies. It's a nice tree but doesn't send out new wood from older wood very much so trees become inefficient with empty space in center of tree. If you know this is its nature you can compensate by pruning carefully to keep inner wood going. Mine gets some split pits but the quality is very good for an early peach as well as having good size. Harcrest is another good peach from that program that's become difficult to find. It's rather rot resistant for a late and very good eating. I've had clients consistently get its fruit from unsprayed trees- not that you could do that in Kansas.

It can be brown rot, but I'm not sure. The way you can be sure you have brown rot is some of the peaches in an advanced stage will have the brown dull powdery stuff on the outside. If that is what you have you need to spray, primarily in the early phases of fruit formation, to prevent the disease, and also perhaps a spray in July just before fruits start ripening. I use Serenade, an organic product, and it seems to work OK. You can also use propiconazole (Monterey Garden Fungi-Fighter). The peaches rotting in the bag are probably rotting due to brown rot, so it does sound like the fungus is present. The only thing about your description that doesn't quite add up is the way the fruits are falling off before they ripen. When you have brown rot they usually don't drop early, and in fact they can "mummify" on the tree, turning all shriveled and gross. Also it sounds like the fruits falling off look fine, just hard and unripe. It makes me wonder a bit if a storm or hail or something didn't come through and blow them off. One last thing it could be is some varieties of peach can drop fruits when they are young trees. It is common for them to drop in June but is not common to drop so late. Overall, I would spray for brown rot next year and hope for better luck.. Scott

I guess people there are in love with chemicals. Maybe. Maybe they are in love with harvests. Organic stone fruit might be the hardest practice there is, esp with heavy rains after bloom set. Nonetheless, there is no need to spray every three days. You should understand the disease cycle and how to attack this fungus, which requires both cultural and...er...'spray' control. The non-cultural tools in the toolkit still involve sulfurs and coppers and correct timing. If you find neem or milk works, write down details and write up something this fall and publish it, as others would like to know too. Good luck. It's a terrible year for a delicate crop. Dan