The white peach looks almost unreal in the sunlight: Light yellow, round and large.

Look at this! I actually had no idea that white peaches existed until last year. It's not exactly something I would google just like that. But then I happened to walk past a pot labeled Ice Peach in a plant nursery. A white peach. And I fell in love!

Slow-growing peach variety

I had to buy the Ice Peach of course, even though I knew that I might not succeed in growing it. I was told that this is a slow-growing and small variety. You can even put it in a pot. But I had my mind set on the polytunnel instead.

I planted my white peach tree in the large polytunnel in August 2017 and it seems to be thriving in there. It looked truly amazing in spring this year, with an abundance of white little flowers. I did my best to keep up with the pollination with the help of a little paint brush.

My little peach tree started to produce quite a lot of fruits within just a few weeks. I decided to remove some of them since I just didn't expect to get many full-grown ones with that many from the beginning. I kept around 40 little fruits on the tree.

The peach tree stands along one of the long sides, planted straight into the soil with wood chips as mulch around the stem. The tree was quite small last spring, but has grown a lot since.

So many peaches! Even after I removed around half of the new little fruits in the beginning, because I didn't think the tree could support the weight.

Watering your trees

Watering the trees in the polytunnel can be a bit of a challenge. The trees spread their roots quite far under the garden fabric (which I covered with wood chips), and it's nice and moist down there now. But when it's dry, I need to be more careful with how much water I use. You could for example use a bucket and drill a hole in the side, so that the plant gets a steady supply of water.

Late harvest

Ice Peach takes longer to ripen than two of the other varieties here in my garden, Frost and Riga. It wasn't until the end of August that the peaches finally started to feel soft. Most other peach varieties ripen a lot sooner than that. We had eaten most of the Riga peaches already in July!

Ice Peach really stands out, not only because of the color. It tastes absolutely fantastic too! It's the best peach I've ever had. The white peach is crispy but perfectly juicy too. And not too sweet like some other peaches. The white peach seems to be quite reliable too. My other peaches have a tendency to ripen and almost turn bad in the blink of an eye. Ice peach is different though. The fruits stay on the tree and they don't get too soft or fall down. I simply love this white peach!

The whole tree smells like peaches and the fruits look so appetizing!

Being able to give the children homegrown peaches from July until September is just wonderful!

Growth and hardiness

I can't say that much about the hardiness, other than sharing the fact that I grow my vegetables in zone 3 and that I have had nice results overwintering the tree in my polytunnel. I probably wouldn't grow it outside though, considering how slow the fruits ripen.

We haven't grown tired of eating the beautiful white peach fresh yet. I might make jam next year if we get a bigger harvest.

You can use peaches for almost everything! I like making peach pies, marmalade, jam, pastries and even juice.

If you grow this peach tree in a pot, it can grow to around 6 ft 7 which is perfect for a polytunnel. I'm going to look for more information about how to prune it, but I'm guessing it's going to be a bit of trial and error in the beginning. But that's ok! I'm really happy with the 35 fruits we got this year and I'll be thrilled of we get as many next year. And the kids will be ecstatic too of course! They were all waiting for me to write this post so they could finally take the peaches to school. I'm guessing that they will want to show these strange-looking but delicious fruits off to their friends!

Many of you have been asking for advice on how to grow peaches outdoors. I'm going to write more about that soon. Good luck growing this beautiful white peach tree at home!
/Sara Bäckmo