No amendments. No fert. The standard directions apply: hole no deeper than rootball, 3x width. You will have much timed care: dormant spray, pick up all litter, etc.

Dan

I'll repeat Dan's statements, just to make it stronger: do NOT amend the soil with anything at all, and do NOT put a layer of anything in the bottom of the hole. As a matter of fact, that hole should be no deeper than the root ball itself, maybe shallower to insure that it sits a bit high.

Adding your organic components as a mulch afterwards is a much better idea.

Thanks for the advice, folks. I should have also added that this is not a grafted nursery tree, but rather a naturally-occurring sapling.

I just got a call back from the fruit specialist at my local Extension office, and he tells me that they always fertilize their peach trees at planting time. He said that yes, there can be some concern about burning the roots, but that compost, aged rabbit manure, and the other organic materials I have available wouldn't be a problem, and he recommended that I work them into the soil before planting. He didn't think I would need any lime, unless I thought that my soil was exceptionally acidic (I think it's just "somewhat" acidic, as New England soils often are).

One interesting thing he told me about the non-nursery saplings is that their flavor can be a bit of a crapshoot, and not necessarily as good as some nursery varieties, but on the plus side, these trees are often more disease- and pest-resistant.

My soil is almost pure beach sand, that you would find next to the river. I've grown several peach trees over the years. Don't do anything other then dig a hole. I like to dig them a little big, but that is just me. Other then that I would MULCH an area around the trunk...may a couple feet out. I've done it with all my fruit trees and they seem to thrive.

You'll have to figure out how you want to shape the tree (I'd try to keep the center open) because they do grow very fast. They also fruit on 1 year old wood (wood grown this year, will have fruit next year)...

From there on the pests/disease are your biggest obstacles. Brown rot, peach leaf curl, various beetles and moths...

He said that yes, there can be some concern about burning the roots, but that compost, aged rabbit manure, and the other organic materials I have available wouldn't be a problem, and he recommended that I work them into the soil before planting.

Sigh. So much to do, so little time.

Dan

Dan, I assume you think the Extension's fruit expert is wrong...but I can't tell why or how if you don't offer more information.

In most soil types, amendments make the soil texture different, affecting drainage. There is a higher likelihood amendments tend to make the roots stay where there is more nutrition, not extending further out into native soil. When the amendments are gone there will be differential settling, which is why you see younger trees leaning sometimes. Many cities specifically specify no amendments in most areas where they contract out to plant for these very reasons. Those are my specs as well. These are industry standards, including ANSI.

IOW: Tree Planting 101. Like Rhizo said.

Dan

leira, part of the reason fertilization upon planting is not usually recommended is that it can cause 'stimulated growth' AT THE EXPENSE OF ROOT DEVELOPMENT. Woody plants really can't do both at the same time, and trust me....you want your tree to expend it's energy on root development. 'Normal growth' will occur in good time.

Here's a rule you can carve in stone: you should never add lime unless you have the results of a soil test in your hand indicating that the pH is very low. You can't take the lime back, not the chemical reactions it triggers. Adding lime when the soil does not need it can cause all kinds of problems. Most plants, by the way, thrive in 'somewhat' acidic soils. Why not call your extension office back and find out how to take soil samples for them to test.

It's been proven through many years of research and study that amending the soil of a planting hole can be detrimental to the tree. It can drastically increase the establishment time, can encourage circling roots, etc. This would be true for fruit trees as well as all others. Any list of BMP (best management practices) has had the rule of no amendments on it for many years. (On my specs, too, Dan!)

Frank's advice about pruning is good. Here, the rules for fruit trees are quite different from that for other trees. If your goal is to produce (eventually) heavy crops of peaches, early structural training is a must. Your extension specialist will be able to help you with that. Who knows, he might even come over and show you how to do it! I used to LOVE to prune and train fruit trees.

Surely the MA Extension has a publication on home orchards - that's what they do. Their raison d'etre.

My atch above was from my alma mater, which is what they do. But generally wrt pruning I agree open center and not too tall so you can spray (and spray again) and pick without too much danger.

Dan

Dan, I had trouble finding a specific publication (though my Extension office has links to a publication from another state). However, I spoke to the guy who writes the publications.

Nonetheless, all of this is on hold while I dig the hole. I'm running into shale, shale, more shale, and...wait a minute...even more shale. So much shale that I can't stick a shovel in, and need to carefully pry at it. I've seen rocky soils, and this takes the cake. My rock pile is easily half the size of my dirt pile, and I know there are plenty of rocks still in with the dirt. I now understand why my neighbor on that side built a small retaining wall and raised HER ENTIRE YARD. On the plus side, the dirt around the shale is pretty good, and full of earthworms.

Before anyone tells me to plant somewhere else, I need to remind everyone that I live in the city, and the yard is quite small. Taking into account where the sun is, what other things might shade the tree, what other things the tree might shade, etc., I don't have a lot of options for planting location.

My current plan is to dig down as far as I reasonably can, remove the worst of the rocks, and raise the soil level up some in addition to that. Making a raised bed there was something I'd sort of been intending to do in that corner anyway, so it's all for the best that my hand was pressed before the tree went in...because once it goes in, I won't be making changes.

I'm hopeful that putting a tree into that area might help to break up the shale. There are certainly small cracks between the stones, and I'm hopeful that tree roots could work their way in where the curved blade of my shovel has a hard time.

I can only hope you quit digging deeper and used your rockpile to surround a raised bed for your tree and mulched well. Organic nursery pros recommend no amendments for year one. To keep your tree at a reasonable size--and you decide--top it & cut back by half. I do spring and summer pruning. Truly hate cutting my young trees, but it has to be done

Good luck with your tree.

SoTX, have you ever worked with shale? No one will be building any sort of stone wall out of these things. Stone knives seem like a good bet, actually. Arrowheads, maybe. A head for a small hatchet out of some of the "really big" pieces, possibly. The shale vein flakes like crazy into very small rocks...but when still in the ground, they lay together like one solid piece. Annoying. At any rate, I've dug as far as I'm digging. Now to start building upwards.

On the plus side, the worst of the shale vein seems to be on only one side of the hole, and the other side seems more reasonable.

leria, You might want to visit the Fruit and Orchard Forum. I'm sure that there are people from your area on there that would help you out. A lot of knowledgeable and helpful people on that forum. I'm not saying that the information that you got already isn't good info. I think that it is right on. It's always good to have an opinion from someone with similar conditions as yours.

If I had only a small, urban landscape to play with, I would not take my chances with an unknown seedling fruit tree. Small spaces require good choices -- especially if things like size, disease resistance and edible fruit matter. Sure, if I lived in the burbs or the country and had room to spare, I'd give that seedling a shot to see what it might produce, but I certainly wouldn't in the situation you describe.

I know this isn't scientific proof of anything, but I have two peach trees in the ground, and have another I'm getting ready to plant. All are/were container-grown plants (Florda Prince, Tropic Snow and UFO varieties).

The top soil on my planting sites is reasonably loamy, but a few inches down, it becomes pure white sand (I'm in Central Florida and millions of years ago, my yard was a sand dune at the seashore).

Florida Prince was plant in December 2011. No amendments were made to the soil. It has grown into a beautiful tree, but I've never had more than one or two fruit on it, This year, I think the lack of fruit is because our late winter didn't give it any chill when it needed it. We had enough chill hours, but most accumulated late in the season when it should have been blooming. It has only now started putting out leaves and only has two small peaches that I doubt will mature.
Tropic Snow was planted in May 2012. I amended the soil with one bag of Ace Compost mixed with the native soil and backfilled around the tree. It struggled through the summer (I think it was fighting some bacterial spot). But there's a dozen peaches on it now, and it's growing like crazy.

So, I came to this thread in trying to decide whether to amend or not for my new UFO. Given the terribly-sandy nature of the substrate, I would think amending would be helpful, and certainly not harmful.

Thoughts?