This one is from my nectarine tree

This stuff was at the bottom of a peach tree up against the trunk right under the top layer of dirt

Probably bacterial canker.

It could be Gummosis caused by Peach Tree Borer. Brady

Gumosis is a fungal disease. What you have looks more like a bad case of borers. Scrape off the goo and you should find entrance holes and borers inside the tree. You can dig them out with a thin screw driver or wire coat hanger. If you don't dig them out, they will eventually kill the tree. Once you dig them out, be sure
to cover the damaged areas with a good tree sealer.

What is a good tree sealer?

It's an asphalt like substance that is used to repair tree wounds. You can buy it at Walmart.

I have the same thing on both of my cherry trees (a Meteor and Northstar planted about 3 years ago) though one is worse than the other. The gum deposits are especially bad in the crotch of the trees where the scaffold branches come together. This is also the location where I pruned off a central leader (in Feb. or March) to give a more open vase shape. Maybe this helped spread the disease unfortunately. I did scrape it off best I could but didn't see any evidence of borers. The most likely cause seems to be bacterial canker. The other issue I've had with these trees is Cherry leaf spot disease. I'm starting to re-think cherries as a relatively low maintenance fruit tree for the the mid-atlantic area.

I've been using moth balls to prevent the borers. And, knock on wood (strong, uninfected wood!) I haven't had the problem in a bunch of years.

I just poke 4 to 6 moth balls into the soil around the trunk once in the early spring and then again later in the season when the original moth balls disolve. So far so good on borers!

Rhewton-
I had the same thought and have the same issues as you.

Years ago all of my wild black cherry trees bleed jelly out so bad it made a two foot circle of a puddle on the grass. The bore holes are tiny. They're about 1/32" holes and thousands of them. The trees didn't show any die back, but the bark is full of holes! It looks like it should have killed them. I have gull in my spruce trees too. They are small like that, but go in the new growth.

Well, the "jelly" is back on the plum trees. Here is a picture. Is this something that you just have to deal with every year?

Also, I noticed the tips of most of the branches of my peaches and nectarines have big clumps of some kind of black "goo" (technical term) and some of the clear "jelly".

Any ideas?

Good pictures. My vote goes to Stevefruit and to who ever he got his advice from. I have had to do lots of research about bacterial prevention and keeping the whole tree dry or moving it to a dry place like California is the permanent cure for it. Trust me because I mostly live in the western section of Washington state where we know all about this. Another practical short term remedy which is similar to what Steve has done is on page 19 of the .pdf file. If you need to just use the google chrome browsing in opening PDF.

Here is a link that might be useful: 2006_02_Spring_BeeLine.pdf

iamzvonko,

Oozing goo is not necessarily bad or abnormal in stone fruit. It's the trees response to some type of opening in the bark (however minor).

After a period of heavy rain, my stone fruit trees ooze jelly like mad, particularly if it's been dry for a long while.

The goo can by symptomatic of some serious conditions (i.e. borers, canker). Those should be dealt with, but goo itself is not necessarily a big deal.

That said, the bark on your plum tree doesn't look that great, but maybe it's just an old tree.

I don't know what's going on with your peach tips. Perhaps they were killed by OFM larva and some fungus is setting in on the goo.

All the pics make me wonder if you have a pesticide program for your trees. I just mention it because, with all the rain you appear to receive, it will be a hard battle to try to keep your trees healthy without some protection from insect pests and pathogens.

This post was edited by olpea on Mon, Jan 5, 15 at 9:44

Just so you know this stuff if melted in warm milk and drunk is the best multivitamin for men women. Tested and tried. It's nature's gift. Don't treat it as a disease.