Delicious, juicy, peaches of the ANZAC variety! We love ’em.
Kim and I spent the good part of an hour un-netting and picking peaches yesterday as the weather cooled.
We managed to pick about 5-6 kg and left a few for the rainbow lorikeets who have a taste for them. We kept about half of these and gave the other half to a good friend.
This is the biggest crop of juicy peaches we have ever harvested off this tree. I believe that it was a couple of factors that contributed to the larger crop. Firstly, abundant water. We watered with grey water from the washing machine every few days.
Secondly, I didn’t prune the tree last winter and the growth was out of control. So much so that one of the more heavily laden limbs broke off on a windy day.
The plan this year is once the birds have finished off the remaining fruit, I will shape the tree about a metre shorter, and this should allow enough time for some more summer growth before leaf drop in autumn.
I will do the same for all the fruit trees this year instead of pruning in winter as I have in the past.
As this variety is clingstone, they are difficult to preserve, so it looks like we will be eating them fresh or cooking with them over the next couple of weeks. I do like a nice peach and apple crumble. Don’t you?
Yes please….! Do you deliver?
Last year I stewed some given by a work colleague and ate it warm over vanilla icecream… yum!
Hey.. you might know…My apple tree is a dwarf opalescent apple (heritage variety similar to pink lady) and has tiny bug holes in the fruit.. got any tips for getting rid of apple critters?
Hi Kellie. Exclusion bags work best for apples if you only have a few trees. They are like socks that wrap around each apple. Stops earwigs and codling moth.
Funny you should say that. We had peach and apple crumble the other night for dessert… Then for breafast yesterday morning. Delicious. 😀
I bet it was, especially if you made it Jessie!
Oh Gavin, I am drooling! I haven’t had a decent peach in so long and yours look delicious. I have picked my apricots for the season, but they were light on this year. The nectarines will be ready about the middle of this month, cant wait!
I am only just catching up on blogs, as I have been too quiet lately.
I want to wish you and your lovely family a wonderful 2015!
How gorgeous! My ANZAC peach is still a little while away. They usually ripen around the end of Jan here, and are the most delicious peach! Peach crumble is great but I’m a sucker for a peach melba – fresh peach, raspberries and good vanilla ice-cream = heaven.
Do you ever preserve them? I’m thinking of trying to bottle a few this year.
Droooooooooollllllll……..
Hi Gavin,
I freeze a lot of my Anzac peaches in 3 cup serves and make crumbles and pies when the weather gets colder. I’ve done 9 bags already, and think I’ve got at least another 9 to go with more to give away. I do feel lucky 🙂
Madeleine.x
I was given 15 kilos of plums by a neighbour today so will spend the next few days preserving. I use the Fowlers Vacola method and will put up about 100 jars over this summer. This sounds like a lot but the two of us will get through that amount easily over the next 12 months and I will only spend ten X four hour days in the kitchen to get it all done.
Clingstones are easy to preserve. Simply make 2 cuts around the fruit and pull or cut each quarter away from the stone!