Nice post! Thanks for sharing. I've purchased from Starks before as well. One time everything was great....another time I had some issues but they immediately refunded me. Great customer service. This year we need to replace a peach tree due to similar issues as what your's showed, but ours got worse and worse and was an oozing open sore. This was not a tree from Starks but rather a bare root tree at the end of the season (so a sad little stick) from Tractor Supply. I think we will give Fast Growing Trees a try for our replacement. I've heard good things about them. :)