A Detailed Guide to Peach Sapling Planting Methods and Key Techniques

Peaches are one of the fruits people commonly eat, with delicious flesh and rich nutrition, loved by both the elderly and children. Moreover, peach trees have strong growth adaptability and good planting prospects. Below is an introduction to peach sapling planting techniques.

1. Planting

Peach saplings can be planted in spring from February to April or in autumn from August to September. Generally, planting after the soil thaws in spring and before peach buds sprout gives a high survival rate. Find a spot with good sunlight, dig a hole half a meter deep, and scatter an appropriate amount of farmyard manure into the hole as base fertilizer. Place the peach sapling into the hole. Small saplings can be planted bare-root or dipped in mud slurry, while large saplings need to be planted with a soil ball. The plant and row spacing is 4m×5m or 3m×4m. When filling with soil, compact the soil and water thoroughly to settle the roots.

2. Fertilizing

For young trees, control the application of nitrogen fertilizer to prevent excessive vegetative growth of branches; fruiting trees are fertilized three times a year: base fertilizer, fruit-swelling fertilizer, and post-harvest fertilizer. Apply base fertilizer when deep-plowing the soil in October to November, mainly organic fertilizer, accounting for 50% of the annual amount; apply fruit-swelling fertilizer from late April to May during the fruit pit-hardening stage. For early-maturing varieties, mainly apply potassium fertilizer; for mid-to-late-maturing varieties, apply nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium fertilizer, with nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium application amounts accounting for 15%-20%, 20%-30%, and 40% of the annual total; apply post-harvest fertilizer before and after harvest, accounting for 15%-20% of the annual total.

3. Pruning

For trees that have just begun fruiting (3-4 years after planting), there are many water sprouts and dense shoots, requiring summer pruning measures such as bud removal, pinching, and shoot twisting; for trees that have fruited for many years, the tree vigor has become moderate, water sprouts and secondary shoots are significantly reduced, and the proportion of medium and short fruit branches increases. Mainly use heading back, remove overly dense branches and strong terminal branches, and promptly renew weakened branches.

4. Pests and Diseases

Pests and diseases of peach saplings include bacterial shot hole disease, scab, brown rot, anthracnose, gummosis, crown gall, aphids, hawthorn spider mites, peach leafminer moths, peach green leafhoppers, peach fruit borers, brown marmorated stink bugs, scale insects, peach globular scale insects, red-necked longhorn beetles, etc. Timely spraying of pesticides is needed for control.