Probably- This was the warmest winter I can remember down here in the coastal bend. Record highs in the 90s most of the winter then it plunged to 20 for one night the Sunday after new years. Probably too few chilling hours for even the Santa Barbaras to behave normally. Meanwhile, back at the ranch my pomegranates are flowering profusely about two months ahead of schedule.

Thanks, Steve. My ornamental pomegranate is blooming beautifully, but my fruiting pomegranate has zero blooms

My La Feliciana's have not broke dormancy. I have two of those and while I have bloom buds, none has shown any growth. The leaf buds will only come in single buds. Buds in sets of 3 will have two blooms and one leaf bud.

Some of my other peach trees are blooming but not putting on any leaves. I have peaches in pots and all of them except the redskin have bloom and leafed out. La Feliciana has a 550 chill hours. Redskin 750. A have a florida crest that is about 400 if I remember and it has peaches on it, but still is leafing out slowly.

I think the Santa Barbara will be ok, but due to weird winter may not fruit. I have a large variety of chill hours due to wild swings of chill hours from year to year here by the coast. I have an average about 500 chill hours.

I spotted a single bloom on one of my two peach trees but no leaves yet. The largest tree hasn't leaved out nor has any blooms. Yeah, it was a warm winter as I already have cosmos and zinnias blooming, which is at least a month sooner than normal.

Gary, thanks for the great information on buds and dormancy. You are wise to have varying chill hour needs on your different peaches.

Briaustex, i feel better now that I am not alone in having peach trees that are not yet in bloom. I checked this morning and one of the peach trees does indeed have a few leaves emerging!

I have found that new trees tend to bloom earlier than older trees. Many times they get more chill hours if they are shipped from up north.

You might be right about the extra chill hours, Gary, as this one came from a northern nursery. :)

I agree about new fruit trees blooming earlier. We purchased two large apple trees (Anna and Golden Dorsett) in February and they had quite a few apples on them. What is strange is that both trees started blooming in our garden the last few days. I don't know if the new blooms will produce new apples, or if only the apples that are already on the tree will be the only fruit for this year.

Molly