Growing Peach Trees from Seed Naturally

Here's an update on my younger peach seedlings. These photos were from last October, near the end of the growing season. The trees are about 7 months old.

Like the seedling in the first picture, the majority of these seedlings seem to be very well adapted and very healthy, vigorous growers. These peach seedlings had already made it through the first test, as they were planted very densely with other peach seedlings, and these were the ones that survived and grew fast enough to out compete their neighbors.

The second picture is of one of the seedlings that is struggling. This is the only one that I noticed that seems to be having more major issues, other weaker seedlings were probably already selected against. Most of the others look very similar to the first picture. It is possible that this weak seedling could be a result of transplant shock, or due to non fertile soil that it was transplanted into. However, I think it's also very possible that it just happened to be a dud genetically for this area. It may have been a vigorous enough grower to keep up with the other seedlings initially, but the disease and pest issues may be catching up to it.

The parents of these seedlings are growing pretty well in my area, so I was glad to see that the majority of the seedlings seem to be inheriting the genes to grow well here also, and hopefully a couple will even greatly surpass their parents. It also seems reasonable that an unlucky few will get the unfortunate bad set of genetics and struggle here as a result.

I may give the struggling seedling another year, just to ensure it wasn't something I did, like transplant shock or unfertile soil. Even if it is a dud, I will turn it into rootstock and graft better adapted varieties onto it that will thrive here.

I'm looking forward to seeing how these seedlings do this coming year with more room for them to grow and hopefully put on a lot of good growth!

I also observed a huge difference in tree seedlings growing in various spots. Four pear seedlings ranges from 1 ft to 4.5 ft in height. Of the two mulberry cuttings taken from the same tree, one is 3 times bigger than the other. In general, more fertile the soil the plant grows better.
Compared to my one vigorous peach tree in the middle of veggie garden, I also found two mysterious volunteers by the pond dug out of old burn pile. For a long time I thought they were smartweeds since they were so tiny, only 1 ft tall and 1/4" thick. But the leaves did look like peach and they are obviously herbacoeus. I guess high pH and low OM in the soil do them no good. Any way, I piled up some cedar wood chip and compost to amend the soil. See if I am able to identify them when they grow up a bit this year.

This little frog was hanging out on this small peach seedling near the end of last year.

How's everybody's peach trees doing? My tree is full of leaf buds now. The triple buds I saw earlier are all leaf buds too. Oh well, one more year to find out what kind of peach tree I have.

I bet yours will flower next year May!

I spotted the first flower buds starting to swell about two weeks ago! This will be its first year flowering and its third growing season. I'm hoping it'll hold a few peaches, but I'm expecting that most or all of them may drop off this first year. The tree seems to be very healthy and a pretty good size, so maybe it'll hold on to a few!

The first peach flowers started opening about a week ago! Most of them havent quite opened yet.

There are a lot more open flowers today!

This seedling tree seems to bloom over a really long time. It was the first one of all of my peaches to start blooming, and it has a lot of flowers that still haven't started opening. I think that this could be a really valuable trait. By having a long bloom time, it could help reduce frost damage where if some early blooms are damaged it has later blooms that wouldn't be, it provides a longer time frame for pollinators to be active, and also it is available to pollinate and be pollinated by other varieties, increasing genetic diversity in the offspring.

Compared to the peach seedling above, this named variety peach is about to bloom for the first time too, however all of the blooms look like they are in almost the exact same stage.

I'm guessing that this is selected for by commercial growers mainly so that the crop all ripens near the same time, however for the home grower, and even commercially for a smaller and sustainable scale, I think that having the peaches ripen over a longer time frame provides both more resiliency and value than having a huge amount of the fruit ripen at almost the exact same time.

I just stuck a couple of pits in the fridge the other week. We get enough cold for them to stratify outside and I want to make sure they get going this year. Hopefully one of them turns into something worth eating.

Me too!  I am CRAZY about nectarines.    In the fall, I saved a couple of pits from some we bought at the grocery store, cracked them open, and put the seeds into a baggie with damp coco coir, then stuck it in the butter compartment of my fridge and forgot about it.  Lo and behold, both of them sprouted and developed nice root systems.  I left them in the fridge through the winter until I was ready to finally plant them today (March 27th).  It's one of our last chilly days here in the high desert and within a week or so I expect that the sun will be roasting on some days.   I covered the sprouted seeds entirely but shallowly because I honestly wasn't sure which way the trunk was going to come from... I'm assuming the split seed becomes the first leaves?  I figured whatever needed to would push through the last bit of soil.  Anyway, planted them where I want them to grow and mulched them, and I'm hoping to have two little nectarine seedlings soon.

I'm not certain how they'll do here in our crazy climate.  We're Mediterranean but on the cold side @ 6000 ft.  Our summer suns are incredibly harsh at this elevation, so I planted the seeds on the northeast-ish side of our house where they will get some shade, especially from the killer western sun.  I think the shaded location (more so with one than the other) might also help to keep the tree dormant a bit longer in the spring (we have confusing spring weather and many problems with late frosts after early warm weather).  I've heard that planting in a shaded location can help with chill hours as well, though I don't think that will be an issue here.

I have high hopes that they'll taste better than their parent nectarines because they will be grown with love in a healthy permaculture garden as opposed to monoculture, etc.  If not, I suppose I can graft some better-tasting options onto them!

Update on my nectarine pits.  So the Sunburst (the ones with the full length cold stratification): the two pits still in their shells hadn't germinated, but I planted them anyway. The two pits that I deshelled: one seems to have disappeared, the other looked like it was starting to germinate So it got planted too.  The Honeyblaze (the ones with 42 days cold stratification): the two pits still in their shells hadn't germinated and there was some funky mould on the paper towel and their shells. But hey I planted them anyway.  The two pits that I deshelled had both rotted, I didn't bother planting those! So now we wait...

Hope my apricot seeds can slip in here...  I have three Manchurian Apricot pits I will be trying to grow trees from.  DH was nice and very carefully used his vise to crack the shells so I could get the pits to plant
I put them in a labeled and dated zip lock bag with some moist coco based potting soil used for microgreens.   Now comes the wait...  the instructions say they need to stay 60 to 70 days in the fridge. Of course by that time I could possibly plant them outside if I wanted to risk losing them to the squirrels..  Most likely if they sprout I will keep them under lights until large enough for me to feel they are safe from our local wildlife.

Found ONE flower on my 1 year old peach tree.

Update on the nectarine pits:  

Look what popped up a couple of days ago

This one is a Redix 125 - one of the late varieties I sowed outside (without removing the shell) and left outside all winter. Nothing yet from any of the others...

Update on my single peach flower: I hand pollinated the flower with a q-tip but didn't expect the self pollination to work. Now 3 weeks later, there seems to be little peachs growing! Triples too. I guess I need to thin the smaller ones but now the fruits and stem still look pretty fragile to touch.

May Lotito wrote:Update on my single peach flower: I hand pollinated the flower with a q-tip but didn't expect the self pollination to work. Now 3 weeks later, there seems to be little peachs growing! Triples too. I guess I need to thin the smaller ones but now the fruits and stem still look pretty fragile to touch.

Oh wow that's so exiting!  A single flower and you've managed to get triplets!  I've been doing a spot of horticultural husbandry with my fruit trees this year as I only have a few small trees so it's not that arduous. I now have baby apricots for the first time in about 5 years so I understand your joy!  :)

Triplets! So cool!

We had a bad late freeze and most of the peaches fell off my seedling peach. I think I have about 3 or 4 left. Hope they make it!

I think I counted 6 peaches left on the seedling peach tree the other day after the really bad late frost we had. Here's a picture of two sister peaches on the tree from a few weeks ago, and they are still doing well!

I only left my apricot seeds in the fridge for a month before taking them out and letting the bag of damp soil and seeds sit to warm up to room temp slowly.  I have them planted in clear 12 ounce cups with seed starter mix.  I was thrilled to notice today that 2 of my 3 seeds have sprouted :)  The one that caught my eye is breaking the surface of the dirt so I checked the others.  The second one is further behind but has a root and is starting to grow the stem...  The third one is still just sitting there but is not rotting.  

And then there were three!!

So two of the Redix 125's have sprouted - these are the late varieties that were left in their shells and left out all winter.  Then a a few days ago...a Sunburst popped it's head up!  The Sunburst is one of the early varieties that was left in the fridge for a couple of months. This particular one is the one that was de-shelled and I thought it looked like it was starting to sprout when I potted it up.  Nothing else is showing. Yet. But I'm well chuffed I've got an early and a late now

Hi, Alcina. Congratulations on your baby tree, another one! Are you going to put them in ground soon? The first one is growing so big from the photo. Trees have deep root and will be much happier to have room to grow.

I recently pulled up a black walnut seedling, 2.5" above ground and 1 ft beneath it.

Yes the first one shot up, the second one has been much more...stunted...for want of a better word.  The third seems to be following the second.  I suspect the reason is because the first one produced its initial growth in the warm, safe and non-stress environment of the greenhouse. It was there because Spring here has been very cold (and dry) with frosts at night until very recently, which is unusual. I wanted to get the seeds warmer to encourage them to sprout.  It is now a little warmer but wet and very windy!  The tray went outside which is where the second sprouted up. Its initial growth has had to battle strong winds, consequently its little trunk is actually thicker than the bigger first one which has had something of a baptism of fire with the wind! But he's hanging in there! The third, the Sunburst, was very pale when it sprouted (as you can see in the photo) and took what felt like ages to green up.  It's still not that green.  But is proceeding much along the same lines as the second one.

They will all be going into large pots - I have very little space so my fruit trees have to be very close together - too close if they were in the ground. I appreciate this is neither 'true' permaculture, nor growing tree's naturally, but I don't like grafted trees, and the idea of dwarfing stock I find somewhat laughable. It may reduce the tree size a little but they still require substantial pruning if you want to keep them small and all I can think about is my poor tree being choked and starved by its root stock. The tray they are in are long root trainers, so the depth of the tray is a bit more than the height of the first 'tree'.  I'm just waiting until the root ball is firm enough to get out of the tray without losing all the soil, then it will go into a bigger pot.

There are a handful of handsome peaches forming on the seedling peach tree.

Introducing number 4!


Another Sunburst popped up in the midst of the horrid windy, wet and cold weather we've been having  This is one that wasn't de-shelled. So now I have two late Redix and two early Sunburst. Still no sign of the other late that's been out all winter: Nectarlam; or the other early that spent a shorter time in the fridge: Honey Blaze. Of all of the original nectarines I sampled Honey Blaze was my favourite, so really hoping I get one of those, but hey, the others were also good  

It's TWINS!!!

So if you look in the photo above there are what appears to be two little trunks on the new Sunburst.  I thought at first that one of the them was just a branch and where it joined the trunk would surface as the seedling grew a little.  But it didn't. It remained as two trunks.  I decided it was time to pot up and I took a chance and delved down into the root ball.  They are two separate little nectarine trees!  This is a nectarine pit that I didn't de-shell, and there were obviously two seeds in the pit and both have germinated.  I gently pulled them apart and potted them up separately.  So now I have 2 Redix and 3 Sunburst.

But wait, there's more...



In the picture you can see the twin Sunburst nectarine seedlings.  In front of them is a pot containing  a blood orange seedling. But...again...it appears to be twins!  However, this was a pip that I removed the outer case before sowing and there was definitely only one seed in there. When I repotted it I also delved into the root ball a little, but this time, the seedlings seemed to be joined at the cotyledon bits (not sure if they're called cotyledons with citrus), so I think it is identical twins rather than the fraternal twins of the nectarine.  No idea if such a thing actually happens with citrus.  I know there are polyembryonic seeds, like avocado, which can produced three or four shoots, but I thought citrus was a single embryo.  Ready to be stood corrected!  Behind are the Antonovka apple seedlings, also potted up.  And behind those are what are supposed to be cherry seedlings but not a single one has germinated. I guess I did something wrong with their scarification. Oh well, I''ll try again next year.

EDIT:
According to wikipedia (so it must be true! ) certain citrus can be polyembryonic, but one twin is a clone of the mother (the nucellar-cell-derived embryo), the other twin is the love child of mummy and daddy.  So my little blood orange seedling (I have only one, there was only one seed in the the entire bag of delicious Sanguinelli oranges!) could be two slightly different plants, but one of them will be identical to the mother and therefore produce the exact same delicious blood oranges. Golly, how very exciting!

The quote from Wikipedia:

The genus Citrus has a number of species that undergo polyembryony, where multiple nucellar-cell-derived embryos exist alongside sexually-derived embryos.[8][9] Antonie van Leeuwenhoek first described polyembryony in 1719 when the seed in Citrus was observed to have two germinating embryos.[3] In Citrus, polyembryony is genetically controlled by a shared polyembryony locus among the species, determined by single-nucleotide polymorphism in the genotypes sequenced.[8] The variation within the species of citrus is based on the amount of embryos that develop, the impact of the environment, and gene expression.[9] As with other species, due to the many embryos developing in close proximity, competition occurs, which can cause variation in seed success or vigor.[9]

[3] Batygina, T. B.; Vinogradova, G. Iu (2007-05-01). "[Phenomenon of polyembryony. Genetic heterogeneity of seeds]". Ontogenez. 38 (3): 166–191. ISSN 0475-1450. PMID 17621974.
[8] Nakano, Michiharu; Shimada, Takehiko; Endo, Tomoko; Fujii, Hiroshi; Nesumi, Hirohisa; Kita, Masayuki; Ebina, Masumi; Shimizu, Tokurou; Omura, Mitsuo (2012-02-01). "Characterization of genomic sequence showing strong association with polyembryony among diverse Citrus species and cultivars, and its synteny with Vitis and Populus". Plant Science. 183: 131–142. doi:10.1016/j.plantsci.2011.08.002. ISSN 1873-2259. PMID 22195586.
[9] Kishore, Kundan; N., Monika; D., Rinchen; Lepcha, Boniface; Pandey, Brijesh (2012-05-01). "Polyembryony and seedling emergence traits in apomictic citrus". Scientia Horticulturae. 138: 101–107. doi:10.1016/j.scienta.2012.01.035.

That's so neat Alcina!

When I shell almonds (closely related to peach), I sometimes find two seeds in the shell. I don't know the provenance of the embryos though, whether they are identical twins or fraternal.

I planted some peach pits last fall and none of them came up (I am in northern Utah). Did you do anything special prior to planting? I'm surprised to see how quickly your peach trees have grown!

I can understand growing a locally-adapted annual vegetable, but growing a locally-adapted peach seems much harder due to the long time span between planting and harvesting. Do you have a timeline or specific plan you are working through? And if you obtain something you are really happy with, where do you go from there? Do you clone your new variety onto existing root stock, or do you keep on breeding?

I started a peach tree from a pit several years ago and it's only 6 inches tall or so yet, but I see what you all have started and they seem to shoot up really quickly! Why is mine so slow growing? For context, it's directly East of an existing peach tree maybe a foot or so away from the other tree.

I tried the hammer method unsuccessfully.  Then I
tried deshelling some peach pits several years ago using a bench vise. Much easier! I just cranked really slowly at end and quit as soon as I heard the crack.

Kevin Young wrote:I planted some peach pits last fall and none of them came up (I am in northern Utah). Did you do anything special prior to planting? I'm surprised to see how quickly your peach trees have grown!

I planted a couple dozen peach pits in  damp soil in a container and kept them somewhat protected for the winter, where they'd get cold but not as cold as outdoors. I did not crack or nick the shells. Then I sowed them out in a garden bed in early spring. They certainly didn't all sprout, but maybe a a quarter did. Now three years later I've got about 10 trees planted out to different places.

Kevin Young wrote:I planted some peach pits last fall and none of them came up (I am in northern Utah). Did you do anything special prior to planting? I'm surprised to see how quickly your peach trees have grown!

Lots of great questions Kevin! The way I did it was to immediately plant the seeds after removing it from the fruit. I planted them in a small 2ft diameter nursery bed, just pushing the seed about an inch down with my thumb. I didn't keep track, but I would estimate that I had over 90% germination. They were outside all through winter and came up great in the spring. I planted some other seeds in early spring thst I had kept in the fridge since the last summer and had less than 10% germination. So I now try to plant all of my fruit seeds as soon as I eat them if I can.

I can understand growing a locally-adapted annual vegetable, but growing a locally-adapted peach seems much harder due to the long time span between planting and harvesting. Do you have a timeline or specific plan you are working through?

Peaches can fruit rather quickly, usually by the 3rd growing season on a healthy tree. I have seen good results on wild trees on the first generation, and these were from random store varieties most likely. By using more locally adapted parents, I expect the results to be even better.

And if you obtain something you are really happy with, where do you go from there? Do you clone your new variety onto existing root stock, or do you keep on breeding?

I hope to propagate it and offer it for sale to others as an own root tree, and also keep breeding with it.

Good luck if you plant some more seeds Kevin!

Ryan Kremer wrote:I started a peach tree from a pit several years ago and it's only 6 inches tall or so yet, but I see what you all have started and they seem to shoot up really quickly! Why is mine so slow growing? For context, it's directly East of an existing peach tree maybe a foot or so away from the other tree.

I've found that they grow really quickly in well draining soil with lots of sunlight.

Hope your tree grows well Ryan!

Ryan Kremer wrote:I started a peach tree from a pit several years ago and it's only 6 inches tall or so yet, but I see what you all have started and they seem to shoot up really quickly! Why is mine so slow growing? For context, it's directly East of an existing peach tree maybe a foot or so away from the other tree.

As I'm not really growing mine "naturally", but in pots, my pits went into root trainers (so about 2 inches square by 8 inches deep), since they sprouted they've been sitting on a barrel in the garden, still in their trainers until they're big enough with enough of a root ball to transplant into a proper pot.  Full sun (plenty of watering).  With the sun they have shot up.  Maybe yours is too close to the other tree and is in its shade?

Kevin Young wrote:I planted some peach pits last fall and none of them came up (I am in northern Utah). Did you do anything special prior to planting? I'm surprised to see how quickly your peach trees have grown!

I sowed a total of 13 pits, and 4 have germinated (one producing twins!). Some were sowed last Autumn (Fall) - I ate the nectarines, soaked the pits in water for about 24 hours, then put them into the potting compost in the root trainers.  Left them out all winter, just making sure they neither dried out nor drowned.  The others were sowed this Spring - I ate the nectarines, put them into damp kitchen towel, into plastic boxes in the fridge for a few weeks. Of these, some were de-shelled and some were not, they were removed from the fridge, soaked in warm water for 24 hours and put into the root trainers. I've had mixed results with all three methods.  One lot of direct Autumn sown pits has had half of them germinate, the other lot have not germinated at all.  One lot of Spring sown refrigerated pits has germinated, the other lot has not. Of the ones that have germinated, both the in-shell and de-shelled have germinated so I'm not sure it makes that much difference, though if they are going to germinate it's possible that the de-shelled ones manage to push up slightly earlier.

So..in short...two of the four varieties I sowed have had zero germination.  The other two varieties have germinated regardless of which method I used.  Each of the varieties comprised the pits from a single bag of nectarines.  So the reason why some have germinated and some haven't could be to do with variety, perhaps some simply are more fecund than others; or could be to do with the picking/storage/transport of that particular bag of nectarines.  What happened to those nectarines before I scoffed them is unknown. Given that I really liked the Honey Blaze, I am intending to try to find them again in a supermarket and try again with a different batch of nectarines.  I may also have a quick ferret in the root trainers to check if the pits still there have rotted, and if not, I'll just leave them out and see if any pop up next year.  They could just be shy

Thanks for the feedback, Steve. I think my situation is probably neither of those things... time to try another location!

Rebecca Norman wrote:
I planted a couple dozen peach pits in  damp soil in a container and kept them somewhat protected for the winter, where they'd get cold but not as cold as outdoors. I did not crack or nick the shells. Then I sowed them out in a garden bed in early spring. They certainly didn't all sprout, but maybe a a quarter did. Now three years later I've got about 10 trees planted out to different places.

The oldest of my seedling peach trees has about 10 or 15 fruits! I'm so excited.

I don't have a lot of area to experiment with fruit trees between shade from 90' pines and deer, so i'm not sure random seedling peaches appeal to me. I'd written peaches off because the extension agency describes them as a high fuss fruit, but then i heard about the Blood Cling (Indian or Cherokee) peach that reproduces true enough from seed and was propagated extensively in the southeast by the native peoples before John Lawson traveled in the area between 1700 and 1711.

I know the pandemic put a great deal of pressure on nurseries, i wonder if this fall there will be plants begging for homes. Anyhow if anyone is growing blood clings , i'd love some pits!

Hi. I'm new to the forum. I live in the Southern California desert and this winter/spring I winterized 5 peach/nectarine seeds and four out of five sprouted in the spring. I kept them indoors near a screened sliding door so they'd get natural light and be protected from the local wildlife.  Unfortunately, this was an unusually hot summer here and only one survived the brutal temps as I only have evaporative cooling in the house. I did provide afternoon shade when it was the most extreme but it didn't help the others. Even so, the one that's left is 18 inches tall and looking beautiful.

But I'm going to try again. I have four freestone pits that were from delicious organic peaches and they're currently in the fridge in a baggie with some moistened coco coir. With temps being so unpredictable these days I'm reluctant to buy a tree that's used to better conditions and that might not survive here.

I'm so glad I found your website/forum. It gives me hope.

Thanks!

updates on my peach tree:

First, I lost the fruits. Plum curculio found them and attacked the biggest peach, which was over an inch. I removed it thinking the other two small ones would take over. No. They just shivered and died too.

Then I thought about trimming away some lower branches so chickens can scratch underneath, getting rid of pest grubs. Somehow the wound didn't heal completely and I saw clear resin oozing in rainy days. Don't look like a bad case of gummosis but is there some way to help the tree heal?

Now the peach tree reaches 11ft tall and 9 ft wide, but it's very asymmetrical. The mass on the south side almost twice as much as the north side. Since every time I messed with this tree it made things worse, i will just let it grow whatever.

May Lotito wrote: updates on my peach tree:

Neat to see an update May!

First, I lost the fruits. Plum curculio found them and attacked the biggest peach, which was over an inch. I removed it thinking the other two small ones would take over. No. They just shivered and died too.

Mine did the same thing. I think it was a combination of curculio and frost damage on mine. Hoping to taste the fruit next year though, and I bet yours will produce a lot next year!

Then I thought about trimming away some lower branches so chickens can scratch underneath, getting rid of pest grubs. Somehow the wound didn't heal completely and I saw clear resin oozing in rainy days. Don't look like a bad case of gummosis but is there some way to help the tree heal?

I bet it will heal over fine on its own. Mine usually do the same thing from wounds, and then will eventually heal over.

Now the peach tree reaches 11ft tall and 9 ft wide, but it's very asymmetrical. The mass on the south side almost twice as much as the north side. Since every time I messed with this tree it made things worse, i will just let it grow whatever.

I've come to the same conclusion. It seems like that if I can leave it alone, it does much better.

Your tree looks awesome May, thanks for sharing the update!