Growing Peach Trees from Seed Naturally

I'm planning on making a peach cobbler from local peaches. I didn't realize that just planting the pit in the ground after processing has a good germination rate.

Are peaches grown from seed similar to apples when it comes to the random chances of being a delicious peach or not? I wonder if there are alternative uses for less tasty fruit?

Hello Timothy, of the five mature peach trees that I have grown from their pits, only two had mediocre tasting fruit, the rest grew true and tasted as good as the parent.

I have grafted a plum onto one of them and grafted good flavoured peaches on the other. The plum has taken successfully but the peach on peach grafts were T-buds that I did in February have no signs of life yet (spring here in the southern hemisphere).

If the t-buds don't take, will so a couple more grafts.

Peaches usually bear fruit relatively quickly, within 3 years in my experience, much quicker than apples.

You can always make vinegar with them. But if the parents are good i don't see why the offspring would be bad. Last year i've had a lot of peaches and only a few on two trees tasted not so nice. Badgers took care of them.
I plant the peach trees in rows now, use them as wind block. North south i plant delicate fruit trees and straight up in the sun peach trees. Nothing is as heat resistant as they where i am i found.

Years ago I transplanted a peach tree that came up in the compost pile (yellow freestone), and also a Cherokee white given to me by a friend.  The Cherokee had small, not so good tasting peaches, but edible pits.  The yellow freestone in 3 years was producing a lot.  They cross pollinated and soon the squirrels had their own peach plantation coming up everywhere.  If they were in a good spot, I let them grow.   Huge trees, all a little different, but all had delicious fruit.  However, this is borderline for growing peaches and late spring frosts and too much rain as they are ripening make it a little challenging,   Prune out centers, make sure they get good ventilation, plenty of calcium/phosphorous and a little wood ash around the drip line and out, as well as compost.  Whitewash the trunk with lime/manure/wood ash and it will give favorable results with few to no bugs.  One large tree in the apple orchard set so much fruit three large branches split and tore off the tree.  We still had nearly 5 bushels from this seedling tree, and they were scrumptious.   Had to prune back to a few feet high on the main trunk due to the damage.  It grows crowded by apple trees so not enough ventilation but we had a very dry year, so they made it mostly to maturity without rotting.  Bug free with no sprays.  Unfortunately due to the damage to the tree, it will take a bit to recover but we have more trees, just not as productive as that one.  

May Lotito wrote:I planted a donut peach pit in ground last year and in late March a seedling emerged duely. I learned the lesson from the previous seed-grown peach tree for letting it branch out too low, so I bud-pruned this one until it's at least 1.5 ft tall. It puts out at least 8 side shoots after I stopped rubbing off the buds. It looks quite top heavy but it made it though some storms with damaging winds without any problem.

I keep the central leader of this tree but I plan on growing an open vase shaped seedling tree through bud pruning next time, keeping branches in 1-2-3 or 1-5-9 positions.

Hi, wondering if you or anyone else with experience has any info about how to prune a peach seedling / sapling. I'd like to know when (or if) I should prune the 2 small peach seedlings I planted last early spring from seed, from the grocery store.  They are in pots, one has a central leader, 2 feet, has support to grow straight, and it looks good with several offshoots. The other started as a V shape and with two branches, the thicker of the two i tried to straighten with a stick, but the other branch grew longer than the one I thought was the leader, out to the side. The V shaped one is also half the size of the other.

Google led me here, I couldn't find much information on this. Any reqs for book or youtube or any other resource would be appreciated.

Hi Tuesday nights, two or three big branches branching out is quite a normal growing pattern for a peach tree. They are very forgiving in being shaped into whatever we want, but if they're so small i wouldn't fiddle with them, because you cut of a lot of their energy when pruning when young. They invest in those branches, energy obtained by sunlight is in there. Give them a good spot in the sun preferably and when their as big as a person you can start shaping them.
They tend to lose the foliage on the support branches carrying side branches full of leaves. They mostly care for the first hand light, and do not get very big really. They leave room for things to grow under which can be interesting in a very hot dry climate.
I've just shaped them into a wind break for my garden. A row of twenty, one high one low and wide one high one low and wide.
There is a time which is best for pruning for them not to get the curly disease though.

Just like Hugo said, leave the young fruit trees alone and only do minor maintenance. One can control how much sunlight it gets to get desired shape partly. If the tree has full sun it will naturally grow more side branches to capture it. If it's surrounded by other plants it will be slimmer and tall. The tree will self prune a bit when it grows bigger so that some weak lower twigs get shaded out and die back. If maximum productivity and easy management are not the primary concerns as opposed to the commercial production,  I would let the tree grow as is to maturity.

BTW, my  two-year old donut peach tree is doing good albeit it got attacked by the periodical cicadas this summer. I saw quite a few fruit buds so it will produce in the third year just like my yellow peach tree.

New row of peach trees on a new plot. Facing south, because they can handle anything where I am..

I just grew a organic palisade peach seed. Its about 2 inches tall but the base of the stem is brown. is that normal? I cant find any photos online of sprouted peach seeds. Can anyone tell me if this is a normal browning at the base or is it disease or over watering?

Jacob Isebrands wrote:I just grew a organic palisade peach seed. Its about 2 inches tall but the base of the stem is brown. is that normal? I cant find any photos online of sprouted peach seeds. Can anyone tell me if this is a normal browning at the base or is it disease or over watering?

That's normal.

If it were a disease it would look rotten on top , but do your watering from down, let it dry and then water again.

My dad has talked about some delicious peach trees from his youth and finding this thread has me thinking we should put some pits in the ground sooner than later. Anyone have updates on their plantings?

Suzette Thib wrote:My dad has talked about some delicious peach trees from his youth and finding this thread has me thinking we should put some pits in the ground sooner than later. Anyone have updates on their plantings?

I have had good luck just throwing the seeds out on my garden. Lost my last garden space to a peach grove. They flowered in 3-4 years and produced peaches the next year. Last year was amazing. I had 32 peach sprouts. Less than half survived but I transplanted a half a dozen and left the others to grow where they sprouted. No special care was taken of the seeds.

Timothy Norton wrote:I'm planning on making a peach cobbler from local peaches. I didn't realize that just planting the pit in the ground after processing has a good germination rate.

Are peaches grown from seed similar to apples when it comes to the random chances of being a delicious peach or not? I wonder if there are alternative uses for less tasty fruit?

Peaches seem to be a lot like their parents for me, probably because they are self fertile a lot more than apples. I tasted about 10 seedlings this year for the first time, and they were all very similar to their parents, so I'm guessing most of mine were either self pollinated or either the mother peach has a strong influence on the taste in peaches.

Suzette Thib wrote:My dad has talked about some delicious peach trees from his youth and finding this thread has me thinking we should put some pits in the ground sooner than later. Anyone have updates on their plantings?

Peaches have been hard to grow here due to late frosts, but last Spring the frosts held off, and I got to taste a lot of peaches.

I tasted a seedling of the wild seedling mentioned earlier in this thread and they were very good, however were very susceptible to brown rot. I hope to cross this one with another peach tree that is resistant to it and am hopeful on getting some good tasting seedlings from the cross that are resistant to the disease. The seedling is also a little more frost resistant than some other ones, so looking to try to increase that trait.

Hi Steve Thorn.
With the weather getting more eratic those late frosts seem to be a bigger problem every time. I never understood why we as gardeners have to put up with these early flowering varieties. If you're an orchard i understand you want to be the first, because you can charge top dollars. But we as amateurs should have late to extremely late flowering fruit trees. I'd love to eat peach from june to october. Instead of everything at once.
For apples i got some late flowering long keeping variety like court pendu gris(french). And i tried to get apples that are hanging around Christmas and get better after the frost, but i'm not yet super skilled with grafting, and took them too early so they died.... I've got two late cherries, but with peaches i have no info on it.
Any thoughts?

Hugo Morvan wrote:Hi Steve Thorn.
With the weather getting more eratic those late frosts seem to be a bigger problem every time. I never understood why we as gardeners have to put up with these early flowering varieties.

We have commercial peach trees growing from Michigan to Georgia, a huge north-south range. You could try to find the northernmost peaches grown in Europe and plant their seeds in your garden. Those should be later-blooming.
I have been growing peach trees from pits from the local market. No idea where they were grown, but they do well here. I get a few to many peaches most years and rarely no peaches.

Hugo Morvan wrote:Hi Steve Thorn.
With the weather getting more eratic those late frosts seem to be a bigger problem every time. I never understood why we as gardeners have to put up with these early flowering varieties. If you're an orchard i understand you want to be the first, because you can charge top dollars. But we as amateurs should have late to extremely late flowering fruit trees. I'd love to eat peach from june to october. Instead of everything at once.

Yes I'm surprised this hasn't been the goal of more breeding programs. It is a huge thing that I'm selecting for in my seedlings.

For apples i got some late flowering long keeping variety like court pendu gris(french). And i tried to get apples that are hanging around Christmas and get better after the frost, but i'm not yet super skilled with grafting, and took them too early so they died.... I've got two late cherries, but with peaches i have no info on it.
Any thoughts?

Yeah I love the late flowering apples and long keeping ones also. I've heard that one of the Court Pendu apples is nicknamed the Wise Apple, because it blooms after the late frosts and so was very wise. I thought that was kind of neat.

I added two peach trees grown from seeds, both are white peaches. They are in native soil with little amendment so they are rather small: one is 2 ft tall and the other barely 1 ft. But I don't think white peach or donut peach are inferior to yellow peach becausethey grow slower, their genetic potential is severely limited by soil condition.

The most vigorous peach tree (yellow peach) I have had its first year amidst a veggie garden with plenty of compost and active soil biology.  I am thinking the adequate and balanced nutrients made available by soil microbiome is the key to its healthy root system. Even though I didn't put much resources on it later on, it was still able to retrieve deep down the ground. Until it is limited by the reserve of the soil. I have identified the three most limiting elements and am working on remineralizing my yard. I'd like to find out if the tree will have better resistance to abiotic and biotic stresses afterwards, and has less cold and PC injuries the coming season.