Good God Frank, how can you be doing this when I had such confidence in you? I would say Fruitnuts' recommended 3/4 is about the minimum fruit I would remove from that tree -- and fast. Not only are you way overtaxing the ability of this tree, but the limbs themselves are likely to break. Peach wood is not as strong and flexible as apple.

A couple dozen nice peaches is way better than 100+ scruffy little peaches, and a couple dozen is about what I would leave on that tree. If the tree survives this episode, it may never be the same again.

Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

Jelly/Fruit-

For what i've read, peach trees around here die, and they die young! I've got to get what i can out of this tree this year. I have over 10 seedlings just waiting to replace this one! This was the tree that was marked for death last winter. I told it, flower/fruit or the chainsaw.

And to think a lot of fruit has fallen off!

I'll thin some and report back what happens.

franktank, Thin a lot of peaches to say one foot apart. Then get a 2 x 3 driven in the ground next to the trunk. Secure the 2 x 3 to the trunk with rope. Haul up those branches with rope to the 2 x 3. I've had to do this with a Superior plum not from overload but too much rain.

Thanks for sharing the photo. That is interesting to see. And you are 100 miles or so north of where I grew up. I remember one peach tree but no peaches.

Let us know how the fruit quality turns out.

The Fruitnut

franktank I am sooo jelous and I am worse than you, I wouldn't tin either, I am soooo greedy.
I wish yor tree is in my frontyard so I could tease my neighbours and who ever passas by. i love it.

I have a very small peach tree (5 feet) in a container and 91 peaches on it. I just couldn't tin them otherwise my heart would break.

**** franktank, please send your peach tree to me to ontario, canada.

OMG that poor tree! LOL get some struts under those branches quickly. I'm surprised they haven't just snapped off, already. If you plan to do some corrective pruning when it's time to, you need to have something left to prune.

Frank:

It sounds as if you have written off the future of this tree because you have lots of other seedlings. I would say, not so fast. Any peach tree that will set fruit in your difficult conditions deserves some consideration.

Radovan:

Please believe me that you do not want a peach tree loaded with little peaches like this one. If left as it is, none of these little peaches will develop into fruit that you want to eat. Struts are not the answer here, although they may still be needed after the tree is properly thinned. Peaches become very heavy when they really grow up, which is what you want them to do. With peaches, the recipe is thin, thin, thin, always to the largest, fastest-growing perfect fruits.

Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

Frank,

In cold climates it's generally recommended to prune peach trees in the spring. Pruning in winter can make a peach tree more susceptible to winter kill.

Agree with everyone, there is way too much crop load on the tree. I see the peaches are already coloring up, so it may be too late to affect fruit size. Still, thinning it now will help prevent broken branches, and may help fruit size some.

I would not mind Franktank problem in my Zone 5 and I will thin it to even 13" apart.
I have a three years old Reliance peach. It had two small peaches in its second year which were dropped early. I was expecting some crop (in the 3rd year) but there was no bloom on any of the fruit trees this year except a Dura CHUM.on
Finally I am learning that the summers of all zone 5s are not the same even if they are closely similar in the winter for plant survival. It seems that some zones 5 are much better for cropping than others.

There is more at stake than peaches and branches. Current cropload is directly related to how much energy is left over for winter hardening off and survival as well as setting blossoms for next year. The sooner peaches are thinned the more vigor the tree will have as more energy will be stored. Your tree reminds me of the U.S. economy over the last decade. You're spending every cent on immediate gratification. It's bad enough that your tree was set back by PLC.

Of course you did say that you wanted to kill the tree anyway and now it will be much easier to kill because you will probably be convinced that the fruit is worthless. Sugar is directly tied to fruit to leaf ratio. The leaves make almost all of the sugar.

OK, so my "problem" is with an Asian Pear, but I signed on this evening so see if I already blew it by leaving on too much fruit. This is the 2nd year with fruit---last year I only left on 6 pears, and for some reason I decided to leave on about 6000 this year. Really not sure how many, but enough to make the tree sag. This is after having removed about 3/4 of them right after blooming. I've known for weeks that I need to cut most of them off, but it's so very hard to do. Will the tree be OK? Is it too late? I'm so sad for my tree. After all that work and waiting, will it be OK?

Thanks,

Ann

Ann, your tree will likely be OK but it will be better if you get a clipper and take off enough fruit that there is at least 3" between fruit at this point. That might still be excessively heavy but a lot easier on the tree. The fruit suck up more and more energy the bigger they get.

Ann:

If your trees is sagging now, it is best to do more thinning because it will get much worse. Asian pears are quite dense and heavy, and the branches can easily be broken by a heavy crop load. That would make you feel even worse than you do now. I have 3 Asian pears here, and they set so heavily that I have to thin at least 3 times.

I can't see how crowded your tree is, but thin until the branch sagging is relieved, bearing in mind that the pears still have a month to grow. If there is any damaged or misshapen fruit, take those off first. I space mine out to nearly a foot apart for maximum quality.

Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

a foot apart...wow. I'll do it. My branches will clearly break---I have some of them tied up already. I'll do it today. Thanks for the input Jellyman!

Ann

Pear wood is not prone to breakage, incidentally- more inclined to bend and not break. It is the most flexible of common fruit trees.

I would never space my pears a foot apart unless I didn't like the pears- this is far in excess of any recommendation I've ever seen and probably Don is the only one on this site that goes so far, especially considering that the pears are already partially sized up. It's all about leaf to fruit ratio, not space apart anyway (and leaf access to light, especially spur leaves). What's more- there is a lot of variation in ultimate size of different asian varieties, which is an important factor in spacing. Smaller varieties would be spaced twice as close as something like Korean Giant.

I don't know how much season you have left to improve the quality of the pears- what is the variety and when does it ripen where you are?

Don tends to keep advice simple, which is often what people want- I figure my role is to get you thinking so you can do your own trouble-shooting eventually. Take whichever you can use.

Harvestman:

You are correct that I usually advise more rather than less thinning. This is based on my concept of what the back yard fruit grower usually wants -- quality over quantity. I would rather have a dozen large, beautiful fruits than a basket full of culls. Spacing at a foot apart may be a little exaggerated, but not by much. All of the 3 varieties I grow, Chojuro, Nijiseiki, and Shinseiki, will become quite large with adequate thinning, with Chojuro the largest.

You are also right that I try (not always successfully) to keep my advice simple because eyes glaze over when it is too complex.

The main problem that answermen have to overcome here is the lack of specificity and detail in the questions. One-liner questions are often followed by multiple paragraphs of answers, trying to guess at all the possible origins of problems with very little to go on in the way of facts.

In this case, the Catlady does provide some facts, and since she describes her tree as in the 2nd year of fruiting I would tend to err on the side of more rather than less thinning. It would be easy to break the branches on a very young tree, regardless of some flexibility in the branches.

Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

Well, I did go crazy cutting little pears before seeing the last 2 posts and the fruits are now a foot apart. I don't know the varieties---it's one of those 3 type grafted trees from Raintree, as I only had room for one tree. (They did tell me which 3 types, but not which is which, so the information isn't very useful to me!) As a general rule, I err on the side of over-thinning to ensure good long-term growth and health---I'm really not sure what came over me with this little tree. I'm new at fruit-growing (I've been in my house for 5 years) but hope to be here forever, so I don't mind the possibility of losing out on some fruit to know I did the best for the tree.

I really do appreciate all the discussion and advice from you pro's...

Ann

My tree:

oops: tried to post a link. here goes again:

Here is a link that might be useful: {{gwi:120358}}

Don, I too far prefer quality to quantity but I just happen to think thinning to 12" is overkill, even when this is the motive. Maybe for Korean Giant such a spacing this late in the season would improve quality over say 7-8" but I actually doubt it. My approach to the home orchard quality issue is to prune for a very open tree- much more open than the commercial norm- every chef develops their own technique. All that matters is that the food tastes real good.

In the case of this tree I think your advice is certainly sound- I was initially just responding to the question of whether Ann was killing her tree. Extra thinning may help the tree come out with more vigor next spring.

Biggest problem I've encountered with unthinned pears is thinking that the branches won't break once they bend all the way to the ground - but, SURPRISE! That's what they do.
Even when they've arched all the way over, with fruits touching the ground, and you think "Well, I'm home free, now."
SNAP! There goes the branch.

I've never lost a pear branch to heavy crop load even when customers refuse to thin. Maybe your branches are too large in ratio to the trunk, creating weak unions. Or maybe it's something else?

I've not had Asian pear limbs to break yet, but have definitely broken a few European pear limbs that were overloaded. One point not mentioned here with regard to spacing in Asian pears is where the fruits are coming off. I allow shorter spacing on spurs close to large limbs or the trunk and thin more radically those that are coming off smaller diameter branches further from the trunk.

By the way, my nijiseiki is fruiting for the first time and I've noticed a disturbing amount of cracking. Is this a problem with this variety? I've not had an issue before with my other Asians--ususally just a few fruits may crack.

I'm still wondering about the training of these broken limbs. If you don't eliminate narrow crotches, which pears are prone to develop, then I wouldn't be so surprised about some broken limbs although I have read that even these type branches are less prone to breakage than you'd expect from other species.

One of the 3 varieties on my tree definitely has thin branches. Anything I can do to help this? Maybe just give it more time?

Thanks,

Ann

It’s 2023 and this thread has been helpful. Thanks Houzz!