Our peach trees produce plenty of fruit each season, but when the peach reaches the size of a golf ball, they get a small hole in them and the sap ozzes out and they dry up. We have yet, in the 4 years we have lived here, had a fresh peach. The trees look young and we did prune them back this year, but that did not help. Could someone please tell us what we need to do?

Sounds like plum curculio.

I became a member of HOS becauce I purchased a retirement home in OR where they started, but my original home is in Ala. I have several older peach trees which I have varied crops on year to year. If I do not spray them with a good insect spray shortly after blooming, I have the same problem as AL Gal in Boaz AL. I live less than 60 miles from you. Worms will eat up southern peaches if they are not sprayed. I don't know the type worm.

The insect spray that you use in Huntsville, is it the same type used for Japenense Beetles? I thank you mo1martin for your help.

I forgot to spray this past year and therefore did not get a crop. My house in not colocated with the trees. Because it has been a couple of years, my memory is not that good on the specific spray I used. I have used a Specside (SP) spray in the past, but there are several types of spray in that line. I think that anything that would control Japenese Beetles would work for the peach insects. But look at the instructions to be sure it is OK for peach trees. There is a fly/moth that lays an egg for the worms and you can see them fly away when you spray. The idea is to keep them off/or kill them. Start spraying as soon as the bees stop visiting the flowers and continue at about 2 week intervals until the fruit starts to ripen or other specific instructions on the spray.

Thank you so very much. I have printed this so I will not forget either. You have been very helpful.

Are you sure it is a peach and not an almond? We have heard of a neighbor who strugled for years wondering what to do with this peach, but it was not a peach! It was an almond.