Hereabouts, peach leaf curl and bacterial canker are a fact of life with peaches. And both are far more common than the borers you're stressing about.

Overall management is to apply dormant sprays yearly to help limit the diseases. Also, keep the tree vigorous with appropriate care to avoid other maladies, including borers.

Then, too, periodic "pest inspection tours" go a long way in catching any potential problems early on.

Just having a Peach tree in Mulnomah or Washington counties, is a challenge in itself.

It's one of the more difficult trees to keep robust.

I just laughed to myself as I remembered the one at Portland Community College. The Pesticides instructor pointed it out in 2004, when I repeated for review.

The tree there is trashed. He just wants the landscape crew to keep it in place as a specimen of all that can go wrong with a Peach. Their tree is like a living problem showcase.

Thanks Jean and Mdvaden, I shall persevere. The tree actually looks really good right now.

If you can master the care it needs, it can last for a long time.

The one at the college that I mentioned, is not a maintained tree - just a specimen left to itself.

With proper care and disease control, peach trees can do okay.