I have a weeping peach, from Stark Bros, for about 5 years now. As with other peaches in MI, I can see it has problems. It has peach leaf curl (controllable), European scale--something that I spray for but can't seem to control--and borers. Then on my regular peach trees, the Cur. bugs and hornets attack the fruit, so I have tried using zip lock bags to protect the fruit, a real chore.
Anyway back to the weeping peach--no edible fruit-- ripe fruit is hard, and sour, but prolific. Most of the fruit mummies stay on the tree, which must be removed, another chore. I had to trim out about 1/2 the tree limbs this spring because they were dead. I'm glad I have a picture last year when it was looking gorgeous. Peaches in MI have a life expectancy of about 15 years max before they surcome to disease, etc. So why invest money, time & effort into something knowing you will have to replace it soon. At least Bradford pears give a great showing, and then just split and die. No spraying & hoping involved. Don't know what I will replace it with in a few years, because the color is wonderful and unique.

I know You want information on the double late flowering red. I am not clear if that is the cultivar name

A friend and I got some locally grown 'Corinthian Pink' ornamental cherry trees. their narrow growth was great for us, because we needed them for the narrow strip between driveways and the neighbors front yards. There are also 'Corinthian Red' and I think a 'Corinthian White' cultivar available.

The ornamental Corinthian cultivars began to bloom about 3-4 weeks later than my friend's 'Kwanzan' cherry began blooming. The Corinthians' blooms lasted past the time that her ornamental cherry changed over to full leaf.

We planted our 5 gallon potted sized Corinithians prior to them breaking dormancy this year, and even though they had only a month or so to adjust to the transplant and did not bloom as fully as they should next year, they still bloomed stunningly beautiful.

When we planted them, we poured a liquid sulfer onto the entire surface of the hole and also mixed some into the back fill. Additionally, we also poured over the rootballs some Espoma Bio-tone Starter, which at planting time contributed the most commonly occuring bacterias that help feed trees roots. I think planting them with the sulfur and Biotone kept them from becoming stressed, and that helped to prevent some of the common borer and other bug invaders from successfully attacking.

Both her two and my one just amazed us when we saw how beautiful the flowers emerged. I can see how you have been capitvated by the beauty of the late blooming red flowering peach.

As for the leaf curl infestation mentioned, that is a common problem with most peaches. The reason it can be difficut to control, is that once the leaves show evidence that they have been attacked with the leaf curl pathogens, it is too late for any treatment to get rid of the problem.

For that reason, if there are peach orchards in your area, or homeowners growing peach trees in their yards, it is a good idea to apply the leaf curl preventer prior to bud swell. If you do it during the time of bud swell or for sure during bud break it is too late for the treatment to be effective.

My friend and I did not find out about peach trees' potential leaf curl problems until after our trees had already begun to bloom. We could only wait to see if our trees would be infected. Thankfully none of them have displayed any signs of that common, peach tree infection.

After flowering, our ornamental corintian peach trees produced a green, pea sized fruit which did not grow any larger and is no longer noticable on the trees. As of yet, we also have not noticed the trees producing ground litter, so they should prove good for planting near driveways or walkways.

Even though our trees are not the same cultivar as your late bloomer, the sulfer and bio-tone starter along with the leaf curl information I offered should still apply to your later blooming red peach cultivar.

Same pest and disease problems as orchard peaches. 'Late Double Red' and 'Double Red Late' are synonyms of 'Camelliaeflora'.

Wow! Great information everyone. I love Garden Web.

How does one treat a tree to prevent borers? I'd like to know because I also have a gorgeous Purple Robe Locust (yeah- I know most of you probably think trash tree but a beautiful, drought tolerant tree is gold around here). I'm told the Purple Robes are also suseptible to borers.

I may still try the Double Late Red Weeping Peach even with the faults. I can only have just a few trees in the yard so if it dies in a few years, I can deal with it- then I'll get to try something else! It's just a small ornamental, not a major shade-producing tree. I'm not sure. I'll have to think on it somemore but you've given me some good information here.

When flowering peaches make occasional appearances in garden centers here often they have been shipped up from L.E. Cooke nursery.

Here is a link that might be useful: Weeping Double Red Flowering Peach

Out of curiosity more than anything else, I ordered two weeping peach trees from Michigan Bulb Company about two years ago and planted the two foot tall trees in my yard not expecting much. Two years later I have the most beautiful trees I have ever seen. They have grown to over eight feet tall with little to no care. They apparently shipped me two different types, as one has dark red leaves and the other has green leaves. The one with the red leaves has a lot more flowers than the other one, and produced fruit last year. I know you all say the fruit is not edible, but in late September we harvested our crop of two small peaches and they were indeed edible. They were hard like an apple would be, but the inside was quite good! The other tree with the green leaves has not produced any fruit, and has just produced a free flowers just this year, although it is two feet taller than the other tree. I live in a hot climate (Texas) and they do really well here. I don't know about other climates. I would tell anybody to try these! I am the envy of all my neighbors!
I did prune them back last fall and this spring they look fantastic!

I too have an Ornamental Weeping Peach on the corner of my property. I have so many comments every spring on the beautiful fushia flowers. I have found the peaches to be TART and unedible. The peaches fall to the ground and sour killing the grass below if left there. Blooms are short lived and maintains weeping green leaves in umbrella fashion. What's the best way to keep the tree from fruiting after blooming? Anyone?

My beautiful tree has some black slime at the vase of the trunk. Does anyone know what this is? And how to protect my tree?

need a pic denise ...

in the mean time.. look up gummosis ... if so.. nothing to do about it ...

ken

When I was growing up in Akron Ohio, we had a red leaved Peach tree growing behind our garage, that appeared to be a volunteer. It was way too big to be the "Bonfire" cultivar, and, as I said I'm pretty sure it came up on its own. Anyway, it actually bore small but decently edible peaches. Then my idiot stepbrother chopped it down for no reason at all.