After over a dozen years and four various volunteer trees I am officially over the urge to grow peaches in my backyard. Or any other stone fruit, now that I've been breeding a vigorous crop of brown rot for several years on the fallen fruit.
Bless the pros who do the work to grow peaches for us!

If you want to try peaches in this area, take very seriously all advice you can get.
https://extension.umd.edu/reso...

At one point, I thought peaches were a big crop in Delaware and Maryland.

Stone fruits are a challenge in the east plus a lot of work .Even in the best of years you are gambling with frosts and freezes. They require pruning, fertilization an weed control. They require a consistent spay program to control the myriad of insects and fungi that attack them. Plum curculio, Oriental fruit moth, peachtree borer, lesser peachtree borer, shothole borer, catfacing insects, scale, Japanese beetle, and the green June beetle are the most common.. Brown rot (Monilinia fructicola) is the most common fungal disease, but scab (Venturia carpophila), leaf curl(Taphrina deformans), Gummosis (Botryosphaeria dothidea) are often also present. There are others including several bacteria diseases. Control requires a lot pruning clean up and a long term consistent spray program.
"Growing quality peaches in the home garden can be very rewarding but challenging unless a rigid pest and disease control program is maintained." Clemson University. I grew peaches for years when I was younger, but I am no longer able to keep up with the work required. Peach (Prunus persica 'Redskin')

I don't bother because:

1)Here Peach leaf curl is not merely endemic but belongs to a very aggressive strain to boot. It has even started affecting Almond trees,albeit not in severe fashion.
2)The only peaches I bother with are air dried ones, and it's too much work for me.

You guys in Maryland have it rough with regard to peaches (but not with regard to crabs). Here in California's central valley we don't have as many issues to deal with. My biggest problems are lack of water, extreme heat, and with climate change inadequate winter chill. I do have to do substantial green drop to adjust the fruit load. I have four backyard peach/nectarine trees, all of which bear fruit at different times of the year. Dealing with large peach trees can be a hassle and they generally provide much more fruit than a typical family needs. Three of my trees are genetic dwarfs so they only get about five feet tall. That makes spraying for peach leaf curl easy. The dwarfs are all Zaiger genetic trees - highly recommended. The other tree is limited in size though pruning as described in the attached webpage on backyard orchard practices. https://www.davewilson.com/hom... I suggest that growing genetic dwarfs or performing the backyard orchard practices might reduce some of the labor involved with peach trees.

I've already harvested my early nectarines and have been checking my peaches for ripeness. Just a week or two away now. There is nothing like a tree ripened peach. Or try one bbq'd.

So I've kept two peaches as they are so pretty with early bloom. I made no effort at proper pruning or spraying this year or for several years. But we have picked about a dozen small ripe peaches this year, some trimmed off small rotten areas, and boy are they delicious, the best peaches of any we've gotten this year, having tried a couple farm stands locally, and the so called local peaches at the grocery store. I may give the trees a little attention next year and hope for a few more than a dozen.

It is late January now and in California we are starting to think about spraying the peaches/nectarines for peach leaf curl. I generally wait until about Valentine's Day and just do it one time. Although lime sulfur hasn't been sold for backyard use for years, the product is still available as a pet mange treatment (at 97 percent or more purity). I just buy the mange treatment, compare the concentrations recommended on the old Bonide lime sulfur container, do a little high school chemistry, and apply it carefully. It works great to control peach leaf curl and I don't have to spray a copper solution all over my trees and yard. If you want a good peach/nectarine crop, you have to address the peach leaf curl. There are other peach leaf curl treatments available at the nursery if you've forgotten your high school lessons.