Peach Guild

The fruit tree guild from our own published method for warm temperate climates, USDA zones 5 to 8, where peaches bear within three years of planting. Peach is the centrepiece. Goumi is the secondary, a nitrogen-fixing shrub with its own fruit, coppiced once the peach canopy closes. Garlic, walking onion and wild daffodil ring the trunk to deter borers, grazers and grass. Yarrow, borage, dill and anise hyssop are the insectary and the mineral pump, chopped and dropped as mulch at flowering. Partridge pea and black medick are the nitrogen fixers of the early years, thinned as the shade deepens. Virginia strawberry closes the ground. Plant the peach a year old, keep grass a full metre back, and match the cultivar's chill hours to your winters before anything else.