Pruning peach trees after deep freeze

[deckman22]

As most know we had a deep freeze here in Texas. All of my peach trees were in various stages of blooming and all were damaged in our unusually cold snap. Some of the trees are showing signs of live, new leaves starting to sprout. Most of the smaller branches look dead and have no signs of growth on them. So yesterday I cut off a lot of the dead branches not knowing if that was a good idea. The same is true of my two large gala apple trees but I resisted the urge to prune the dead branches off them as they seem to be bouncing back better.

Should I have waited longer? Should I cut all the dead wood off now or wait til the end of the growing season? Never had to deal with this before.

 

[Chuck]

As most know we had a deep freeze here in Texas. All of my peach trees were in various stages of blooming and all were damaged in our unusually cold snap. Some of the trees are showing signs of live, new leaves starting to sprout. Most of the smaller branches look dead and have no signs of growth on them. So yesterday I cut off a lot of the dead branches not knowing if that was a good idea. The same is true of my two large gala apple trees but I resisted the urge to prune the dead branches off them as they seem to be bouncing back better.

Should I have waited longer? Should I cut all the dead wood off now or wait til the end of the growing season? Never had to deal with this before.

Wait until you know that they are dead. Dead limbs don't hurt a tree in the short term. You can probably forget a big peach harvest this year but next year will be a bumper crop.

 

[deckman22]

Well Chuck you are almost a neighbor, I'm located in Bandera.

Definitely not counting on any peaches this year, may have ruined the pear and apple crop too!

 

[Chuck]

Well Chuck you are almost a neighbor, I'm located in Bandera.

Definitely not counting on any peaches this year, may have ruined the pear and apple crop too!

What is the name of the peaches. Mine haven't done anything except bud swell. I've got June Gold, Sam Houston and an old heirloom white peach I don't know the name of. Are you in Bandera or out in the sticks.

 

[deckman22]

I took the tag off yesterday and must have thrown it in the trash already. I think there were called Tropical Sun, Tropical gold maybe, not sure. 2 of 3 survived. The other variety both died from what I can tell. I will continue to water them for awhile and see what happens but, not holding out much hope on them.

Bandera only by address, out in the sticks down by the river.