Is this a completely mad idea?

2 years ago

I have had a hybrid peach/almond for 20 years or so...and every single year, it gets terrible curl. As the (ahem) crop is actually rubbish (what was I thinking buying this?), I only keep it for the lovely blossom which glows across the allotment and lights up the february gloom. Nevertheless, each year, the tree takes longer to regrow new leaves and this abnormally cold and wet spring finds us going into summer with a totally defoliated tree. It also blocks a path into the flower gardens and this year, the chainsaw finally beckons...apart from one last task.

My squash garden has been encroached upon as the roses and apple cordons have now been joined by an enormous free standing Darlow's Enigma rose so leaving the squash to ramble across the ground is no longer an option. I have a large metal arch for the Uchiki Kuris but wondered if I couyld enlist the peach as a handy framework for the Crown Prince. It is honestly crying out to be used and I think this would be a fitting send off for a lovely, if fairly useless tree. Am thinking it could support at least a couple of curcubits. hey?

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Comments (5)

daninthedirt (USDA 9a, HZ9, CentTX, Sunset z30, Cfa)
2 years ago
Um, why not? It will shade the tree, but if you don't care about that ...
floraluk2
2 years ago
last modified: 2 years ago
The tree is bare anyway. Shade won't make it any worse.
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porkchop_z5b_MI
2 years ago
Agree -- why not?
suzy jackson
Original Author
2 years ago
Yep, I am going to do it - will guide the vines up to the first lateral branches and then allow the vines to grow along them - it is actually quite a spready tree anyway, with the first laterals growing at around 5ft ...and is neatly positioned just next to this years squash bed. IME, Crown Prince can easily extend to 8m of length so standard cucumber frames would be pretty useless whereas something like buttercup squashes can fit on a bamboo A frame. I really don't like to leave them to grow along the ground as the whole plot is very...busy... with many ankle tanglers.

One year, I did lose control of the vines...which decided to grow up into the redcurrant cordons - found a couple of hokkaidos, only after leaf-fall.
DC 8a
2 years ago
My neighbor did this. Used a struggling (unhealthy/dying?) peach tree as support for vines. Every summer it was beautiful covered in a mix of vining flowers and vegs. And lots of neighborly fun picking from the "pumpkin tree" "bean tree" "cucumber tree," etc.

But after the tree was clearly fully dead for a while (don't remember how many yrs), one rainy summer when the ground was totally soaked, it fell over, ripping out of the ground from the dead root ball. Crushed their fence, a neighbors car, and some of their nice landscape shrubs.

So, maybe a good idea to not keep it around for too many years as a vine support if the roots and/or trunk aren't thriving enough to hold it upright. But in the meantime, it sounds great.