Peach Blossom Study

Today is a good day, because I finally get to update my blog. Forgive me, I’m actually going to publish two blog posts today, since I’m trying to catch up.

For this post I thought it would be fun to share with you all the pictures I took during a study on some peach blossom branches I harvested from my own peach tree.

I took this shot from underneath my tree! Love those pink blossoms against that beautiful blue sky. ​

Here’s another shot from under the tree, a little closer up.

Here are the branches that I studied. Some branches on the tree had many more blossoms on them, as you can see above, but they were higher up and I don’t do ladders. I am not about to die just to collect some flowers. Nope.

Let’s take a closer look at the branches so you can see the structure and texture.

The main branch stems are brown, but some (not all!) of the smaller off-shooting branches have greenish stems. Flowers form on all sides of the branch, and have a small stem of their own separating them from the branch. The flowers tend to form in clusters in multiple points along the branch. At this stage in the tree’s life cycle, there are tiny tufts of leaves only at the branch tips, not anywhere else along the branch.

One thing I want to mention is that my blossoms never fully opened. I assume it’s something to do with the climate because it’s been happening to all my neighbors’ peach trees too. The blossoms just kind poof open but don’t fully expand. So, half opened they were 3/4″ wide (1.9 cm) so I estimate that they’d open to a full inch wide (2.5 cm). They will also turn a slightly lighter pink once they open.

Tiny little blossoms all in a row!

Each blossom has 5 petals, approximately 1/2″ long by 3/8″ wide. (1.3 cm L, .95 cm W)

I tried to tape a couple petals down so we could get a flat view of the shape of the petals, but they still curled up on me.

But they are ovals, with a teeny tiny point at the bottom.

There are 5 sepals on each flower, which are a reddish-brown color, sometimes with green spots on them. You can see those more clearly on the bud pictures below. Each sepal is 1/4″ wide and 1/4″ long (.64 x .64 cm).
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The stamen are tiny brown dots with a white stem. The inner row of stamen are 1/4″ (.64 cm) long, but they grow to 1/2″ (1.3 cm) long for the second (outer) row. There are approximately 10 each of the 1/4″ and 1/2″ stamen.
The pistil is all yellow and 1/2″ long (1.3 cm), located directly in the center of the stamen.

Let’s take a look at the buds! (If you look at the close up branch pictures above, you’ll see that there are tinier buds that I didn’t pull off to picture below. Those are mostly just sepals bunched up tightly.)

The largest buds are 1/2″ wide and 3/4 to 1″ long, including sepals (1.3 cm wide and 1.9-2.5 cm long). The smaller buds are 3/8″ wide and 1/2 to 3/4″ long (.9 cm wide and 1.3-1.9 cm long)

The leaves form in tufts of multiple leaves, the longest of which are 3/4″ long (1.9 cm). These do open up and spread out a little as the branch ages, just as the blossoms would if mine opened fully.

One last picture before we go! All the tiny pieces.

I hope you guys enjoyed this flower study! I have been studying lots of flowers, though I won’t publish all of them because some are being used to make patterns for my upcoming book.