Prunus persica Elberta (Peach)

One of the most popular peach trees, Prunus persica 'Elberta' is an heirloom variety from the 1870s, adorned with profuse, fragrant, pink blossoms in early-mid spring. They are followed by large, yellow freestone peaches, flushed with red in mid-late summer. The tree produces as much as 150 pounds of sweet and juicy fruit every year. Perfect for eating, baking, and canning. Self-pollinating, this peach tree forms a rounded crown with upwardly-reaching branches clothed in lanceolate, dark green, deciduous leaves. The foliage provides a deep yellow fall display.

• Grows up to 10-14 ft. tall (300-420 cm) and 8-12 ft. wide (240-360 cm).
• Performs best in full sun in moist, slightly acidic to neutral, well-drained soils. Peaches and nectarines take well to espalier and can be nicely fan-trained against a wall.
• This peach tree has a chill hours requirement of 800–950 (hours of temperatures below 45ºF (7ºC) in the winter for their buds to open in the spring)
• Peach and nectarine trees require annual pruning to remain strong, and healthy and produce bountiful harvests. Such regular pruning will also keep the tree at a workable height, for harvesting, pruning, and pest control. Unpruned peach trees will soon stop producing.
• Watch for aphids, scales, or squirrels. Protect peaches against peach leaf curl, by covering the plant from fall to spring. Bacterial canker, silver leaf, brown rot and replant diseases may cause problems.
• Peaches are propagated by grafting onto rootstocks for fruit or can be propagated by seed, although the fruit from the seedlings is likely to be inferior in flavor to the parent. Seed-raised trees take four to five years to bear fruit.
• Toxic to dogs, toxic to cats, toxic to horses.