Help with Peach Tree Please!

What in the world is happening to our peach tree?

Can I fix it?

Thanks,
Pam

Looks an awful lot like Cytospora canker. That oozing crap that looks like amber is so tell tale. I suppose it could be a Peach Borer too.

I've had this happen before when my husband was using a weed whacker around the bases of my fruit trees. I was going to treat my tree but after researching it I determined it was best to simply take the tree down and replace it with another peach tree. Once a tree is stressed, it's open to these types of infections. If you have Cytospora canker, that's a fungal infection. Fungal infections can be pretty challenging to treat. My husband no longer uses the lawn mower or a weed whacker any where near the bases of my fruit trees. He simply didn't realize how much damage a few nicks could do. Wound a tree and you're basically opening up to attack from all kinds of pathogens.

I might have posted a photo of the amber oozing stuff here in the trees forum back on '04 which is when it happened to me. I'll go check and hyperlink if I can find the photo or I'll go online to see if I can find a photo for you.

Sorry, it was black knot fungus on my cherry and plum trees that I had previously posted photos of not what happened to my Reliance Peach.

Did you or anyone else bang that tree with a weed whacker or a lawn mower? Really looks like you might have Cytospora canker. I found a great website that discusses how you can deal with it should you choose to do so although I don't know that this would be best.
http://tfpg.cas.psu.edu/230.htm
Please keep in mind you probably have a fungal infection. They really are difficult to treat and fungicides in particular are not high on my personal list of chemicals I want to be handling and the timing of applications needs to be precise.

Here's a great photo of Cytospora canker-
http://www.coopext.colostate.edu/TRA/PLANTS/index.html#http://www.colostate.edu/Depts/CoopExt/TRA/PLANTS/gummosis.html

Just for the heck of it, I'm tossing in some links to Peach tree borer information-
http://www.ext.colostate.edu/pubs/insect/05566.html
If you scroll down, I found a photo of damage and similar oozing amber looking crap is present-
http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/IN489
Borers are a real tough cookie to treat too.

We were not using a weed whacker...but the tree did get blown over once. We were out of town last July when there was a wind storm here. Our neighbor lost 18 trees, some trees fell on houses or were ripped from the ground. Some trees were just snapped in half.
We were glad we were not present for the event, and thought we had escaped most of the damage on our property....but perhaps the Peach tree is it.
This is what our tree looked like when we returned.....not knowing any better we pulled the tree upright and restaked it. Guess it had more damage than we thought.
Oh well, one tree is much preferred to 18.
Thank you for your help.
Pam

Ah, I see where it hit the decorative concrete landscape surround. These things happen.

I seem to be having the same problem with a grafted weeping cherry. Cytospora canker? Any cure?

Cytospora canker can affect cherries too.

Would you be in a position to post a photo?

My 15 year old Japanese Cherry had the same problem a couple years ago, then the bark started splitting and last spring half of the tree was dead. I used a wound sealer on the split bark, but I'm afraid we're going to have to cut it down. It's such a pretty tree and it's the focal point of our patio. I have lots of shade plants growing under it and now I'm going to have move everything this spring, and start over with a new ornamental tree. It's not going to be a happy day.

This is what the tree looks like today. The ooze was amber during summer and fall, winter has turned the ooze black.

Say njjpl, There are those who claim there are cures but I'm afraid I'm not sold on them and I'd probably even go so far as to say the cures do little other than to separate you from your money while prolonging the inevitable.

I think this is a situation where an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Maybe it might be best to consider replacements that are resistant to Cytospora canker?

maybe it's a yellow bellied sap sucker

I suppose a Yellow-bellied sap sucker could be at the root of some Cytospora cankers but not the one photographed above. Yellow-bellied sap sucker holes are very orderly for lack of a better term. They frequently create uniform little rows of holes that can wrap around smaller trunks. Kinda neat looking when you find them on a tree that is at the end of its lifespan... not so neat when you find them on a tree like those photographed above.

I figured it was on it's way out. Thinking about a weeping katsura as a replacement. Thanks for your help Equilibrium.....good one Len123.

Morganic, did you find out what the problem was? Cytospora cankers, gummosis, borers? Were you able to fix it? Thanks, Mike

After reading all the ugly words of what the illness might be, I decided to scrape off the goo, spray on the fungus medicine, and see if the tree lived. It did....put out a fair amount of peaches this year....which mostly were eaten by squirrels.

:-)

Thanks, I guess there might be hope for mine. I ordered some lime sulphur on the internet yesterday. What kind of fungus medicine did you use?

I have no idea!