how to save an untrained peach tree

Hello,

Two years ago I planted 3 fruit trees: apple, cherry, and peach.  I'm a newbie with fruit trees, but I read about pruning, and thought I had things under control.  I didn't learn about training until just recently, though.

The apple and the cherry are straight and decently-shaped for the open-center method.  But the peach is kind of a disaster.

It's crazy crooked for one thing (it came that way unfortunately).  I think I can sort of fix that, at least so it's not leaning to one side.

But the bigger problems are that its 3 "scaffolding" branches are very vertical, with narrow crotch angles; and that they're not spread out around the tree very well at all.  They're not quite all in the same plane, but close.  (See pics.)

If this were a younger tree, I think I could easily fix this by spreading the branches out, or using weights to angle them out, etc.  But in this case, it's been in the ground for 2 years, and was (I'm guessing) 1-2 years old when I received it from Stark Bros.  So now the branches are quite firm and thick (1+ inches).

If only I knew then what I know now!

What's my best approach here to "fix" this, other than starting over?  I wouldn't mind that so much, except we're already 2 years into the ~3-5 year time-until-fruit phase, and I'd hate to lose that.

Thanks for any advice!

--
Anthony DiSante

Seems to me like those narrow crotches on the lower two branches will be breaking off during heavy fruit load or an ice-storm, so if it were my tree, I'd go ahead and cut them off now to avoid injury later.  I might also wait to take them off until after the fruit is harvested this summer.

Trim your tree after harvest ore at sumersunset and keep in mind: light,air and life.