In February of 2016 I planted two nectarine trees from Stark’s Brothers. One was a Hardired Nectarine tree supreme and the other was a Stark® SunGlo Nectarine. Last year there was some fruit, but it became infested with peach borers and all dropped and died. This year I sprayed for insects on the 1st and 15th of every month after the first petal fall. This worked, but then I did not spray for fungicide and brown rot killed off about 90% of the harvest. I did not realize that I needed to spray for fungicide separately. Next year I should be good to go.
When planting the nectarine tree I did it on February 1st in a rainstorm at about 8 pm at night. I was thoroughly soaked. I had soaked the roots for about 4-6 hours immediately after they arrived. Then I buried it in the ground making sure the graft was above the dirt level by a few inches. I then made sure to water it daily for two weeks, and then every 2-3 days thereafter for the next year.
Any suckers that appeared below the graft line I immediately cut off. I learned the hard way that the roots would much prefer to feed the suckers than the graft. This resulted in a peach tree dying. The suckers were only 1-2 feet tall, but it was too late by the time I cut them off, the graft was dead.
I did not use any fertilizer the first year. The second year I used a cup of standard 10-10-10 from the local seed and feed shop around the drip line of the tree for the growing months.
It is July of 2020 and the few nectarines that escaped the brown rot, tasted exceptional. I harvested the ones off of the ground and tree that were soft but half eaten away from brown rot and made some nectarine jelly that was really good.
Here are the two trees.
