The Buskirk Peach Tree - 2010

Some of you may remember back when this little blog began 2 1/2 years ago: Justin and I were newlyweds and we were just moving into our current home. At that time a lot of my posts revolved around our precious little peach tree. Neither Justin or I had any prior experience with fruit trees and we were both a little in awe...this amazing plant is going to create bountiful fresh fruit for us. That is not exactly how things unfolded.

That first year we watched one (seriously, just one) sweet fruit grow and grow and grow. About a week before time to harvest the unthinkable happened...some hungry, greedy, selfish bird ate it. I still think about it and have to shake my head in disgust.

Last year was basically the same. Haley was a newborn and we were so wrapped up in our new family that we neglected the little peach tree. I don't think a single flower got pollenated. I felt sad but at the same time wasn't ready to set Haley down long enough to do any kind of yard work. She was so gosh darn cute!

This year I set out to make things right by the peach tree. When the first signs of blossums started showing up in early March I went into gardener mode. In order to turn those blossums into delicious peaches I knew I needed pollenators and in order to get pollenators around the tree I needed something to attract them to our yard. As you have heard in my previous posts our yard has been a little lack luster lately and definately did not offer the enticments I needed. Instead of importing fragrant flowers to place in the yard I decided to play wet nurse to Mother nature and set out sugar water (thanks dad for the tip)...I think I used enough to attract every honey bee in the Houston metro area. It seemed a little silly going out there and refilling the sugar water every other day but I kept at it. And good thing I did....

It might be hard to see in the previous pics but the peach tree is loaded down with little baby peaches. Too many for that pesky bird to ruin for sure. The branches are already starting to sag and it is still early in the developement of the peaches. Not sure how we are going to solve that one just yet but I am sure we can figure it out. I will keep you guys posted on the progress and hopefully have some fruit to share at harvest time. Everything is right in the Buskirk yard at this moment!