Peach profile

Peach belongs to the family Rosaceae and the genus Peach. Peach is a deciduous small trees; Leaves are narrowly elliptic to lanceolate, 15 cm long and 4 cm wide, apically elongated and tapering, margin serrate-toothed, dark green glossy, nectary at base; Bark is dark gray, crevices with age; Flowers are solitary, pale to deep pink or red, sometimes white, short-stalked, 4 cm in diameter, flowering early in spring.

Peach picture

Morphological characteristics of peach

Peach is a kind of tree, 3-8 meters high; The canopy is broad and flat; Bark is dark reddish-brown, old rough scales; Branchlets are slender, glabrous, lustrous, green, turning red toward the sun, with numerous lenticels; Winter buds are conical, blunt tip, pubescent, often 2-3 clusters, middle for leaf buds, two sides for flower buds.

Leaf blade of peaches is oblong-lanceolate, elliptically lanceolate, or ovate-lanceolate, 7-15 cm long, 2-3.5 cm wide, apex acuminate, base broadly cuneate, glabrous above, with a few pubescent or glabrous below in vein axils, margin serrate or coarsely serrate, tooth tip glandular or without; Petiole of peach is stout, 1-2 cm long, often with 1 to several glands, sometimes glandular.

Flowers of peach are solitary, open before leaves, 2.5 -- 3.5 cm in diameter; Pedicels are extremely short or almost sessile; Calyx is tube campanulate, pubescent, sparsely glabrous, green with red spots;Sepals ovate to oblong, apically obtuse, externally pubescent; Petals are oblong-elliptic to broadly obovate, pink, rarely white; Stamens ca. is 20-30, anthers scarlet; Style few as long as stamens or slightly shorter; Ovary of peach is pubescent.

Fruit shape and size of peach are variable, ovate, wide elliptic or oblate, diameter (3) 5-7 (12) cm, length and width equal, color change from pale green white to orange yellow, often in the face of the sun mask red, outside densely pubescent, thin glabrous, abdominal suture obvious, short and deep fruit pedicel depression; The flesh is white, pale green white, yellow, orange yellow or red, juicy and fragrant, sweet or sour sweet; The nucleus of peach is large, away from the nucleus or sticky nucleus, elliptic or nearly round, the two sides are flat, the top acuminate, the surface has longitudinal and transverse furrows and holes; The kernel tastes bitter and the thin taste is sweet. Flowering of peach is from March to April, and fruit ripening is usually from August to September, depending on variety.

Peach distribution range

Peach is originally produced in China, various provinces and regions are widely cultivated. It is cultivated all over the world.

Life habits of peach

Peach comes from the northwest region of China where the altitude is high, the sunshine is long and the light is strong. Peach is adapted to the continental climate where the air is dry and the winter is cold. Therefore, Peach trees are light-loving and have strong resistance to drought and cold.

Peach growing method

Seedling

As a stock with seedlings, seedling height 25-30 cm when the heart, so that seedlings thicken, to the end of summer and early autumn, can achieve grafting on the stock needs of the coarse degree. Transplantation of peach should be carried out after falling leaves in early spring or autumn. Small seedlings can be transplanted with bare roots or mud slurry, while large seedlings need to be transplanted with soil balls. Large seedlings of peach need to be trimmed to form a skeleton. As many as peach trees into a natural cup crown and a natural open heart crown.

Fix the crown

Cultivation of natural cup-shaped crown: after transplantation of one-year grafted seedlings of peach, the trunk was left 1 meter high, the top of the tree was cut off, and the bud of the mouth was cut to keep strong buds. Take out new branches continuously below 1 meter and keep them as main branches. Generally in 30-40 cm away from the ground of the new branch as the first main branch; 20 to 30 cm above the first main branch, choose a new branch as the second main branch; At a height of 1 m, the new branch from the cut-off bud is the third main branch. The three main branches of peach should be evenly distributed around the main stem, preferably not whorled. During summer pruning, the vertical branches of peach on the main branch, the sprout tillering on the main branch and the anvil bud germination on the rootstock are removed, so as not to affect the growth of the main branch and early formation. The second year of winter shearing, the main branch for short cut, cut mouth bud to stay strong bud, in order to cultivate the main branch extension branch.In addition, suitable lateral branches are selected and left on each main branch. It should be noted that the lateral branches of the same level stay in the same direction, so as not to cross each other, affecting the tree shape and ventilation and light.

Planting

Planting peach row spacing 4m×5m or 3m×4m, 500-840 plants per hectare. Planting period of peach from after falling leaves to before germination can be. Peach orchard can not be made, otherwise the saplings grow obviously weak, leaves lose green, new roots become brown and more bifurcation, branch flow glue. This phenomenon is serious in sandy soil or upper soil with low fertility. The main reason is that the residual roots of the former crop decompose in the soil and produce toxic substances such as benzaldehyde and cyanic acid, which inhibit and poison the root system. At the same time, it is also related to the proliferation and accumulation of nematodes in the soil during continuous cropping.

Fertilization

The ratio of nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium required by peach is about 1∶0. 5∶1.Young peach should pay attention to control the application of nitrogen fertilizer, otherwise it is easy to cause barren growth. Nitrogen fertilizer should be applied after the full fruit stage to enhance tree potential. The content of potassium in peach fruit is 3. 2 times as much as that of nitrogen. The basal fertilizer was applied in autumn when the soil was deeply ploughed, and the organic fertilizer was the main fertilizer, accounting for 50% of the annual fertilizer amount. The application of strong fruit fertilizer was in spring at the hard stage of peach fruit. Potassium fertilizer was mainly applied to early maturing plants, and nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium fertilizer were 15%-20%, 20%-30% and 40% of the whole year for middle and late maturing peach. Fruit fertilizer is applied before and after fruit picking, accounting for 15%-20% of the whole year. In addition, the peach garden often need to plow weeding, keep the soil loose, timely drainage, prevent water rot roots. 

Plastic

More integral into a natural open heart shape. The height of the fixed stem of peach is about 60 cm, leaving 3-4 main cinnamon, the main branch opening Angle is 50°-60°, each main branch action to leave 1-2 secondary main branches, in the main branch and secondary main branch as little as possible to leave twigs. There are winter pruning and summer pruning periods. The first fruit peach (3-4 years after planting) have already borne fruit, but they grow vigorously, with many long branches and dense shoots. Summer shearing measures such as sprout plucking, heart picking and shoot twisting should be adopted to restrain the strong and support the weak, and maintain the balance of the peach body. In the full fruit stage of peach trees, due to many years of fruit, the tree potential has been slowed and decreased, long long branches and secondary branches significantly reduced, medium and short fruit branches increased proportion, should be mainly short, and delete overdense branches and apex strong branches, improve the light conditions between shoots; To renew the weak branches in time.

Peach nutritional value

Peach is also the 'Peach of the World' because of its delicious meat. Peach meat contains protein, fat, carbohydrates, crude fiber, calcium, phosphorus, iron, carotene, vitamin B1, as well as organic acids (mainly malic and citric acid), sugars (mainly glucose, fructose, sucrose, xylose) and volatile oils. Every 100 grams of fresh peach contains 88% water, about 0.7 grams of protein, 11 grams of carbohydrates, and only 180.0 kJ calories. Peach is good for people with low blood potassium and iron deficiency anemia.