Properly Pruning and Training Your Apple Trees
Properly Pruning and Training Your Apple Trees
Properly pruning and training your Apple Trees will maximize healthy fruit production. Late winter is a fantastic opportunity to prune your apple trees, and doing so correctly can lead to a bountiful harvest of high-quality apples. In the resources provided below, you’ll discover how the structure of an apple tree contributes to fruit production and helps prevent diseases. Additionally, we will discuss essential pruning techniques to create an open canopy, eliminate water sprouts, and promote horizontal branching. For a more detailed explanation check out these helpful tips on trimming and training your apple trees from the Wisconsin Horticulture Department. Just click the link attached to download the form.
Cleaning up the tree
- Start with the Three D’s – dead, diseased, and damaged.
- When pruning, don’t leave stubs. Prune back to the branch collar.
- Starting at the bottom of the tree, remove ‘suckers’ that are growing at the base.
- Then the interior, looking for long, vertical, straight limbs – those are ‘water sprouts’.
Thinning out the interior
- Remove any limbs that are growing toward the interior, crossing other limbs or downward.
- Remove limbs with an angle greater than 45 degrees relative to the limb it’s attached to. The greater the angle, the higher the risk of limb failure under the fruit weight. Think of a clock face – anything between 10 and 2 is ideal.
Heading back the crown
- Your fruit tree is NOT a shade tree. A tall and wide canopy is not what you need, or want. You want a canopy height that allows for the safe harvesting of the fruit. If you have a more mature tree that requires a ladder, be careful. Gravity sucks, and it’s not the fall that hurts – it’s the sudden stop.
- Reduce the height of the crown, heading off 20-35% of last year’s growth, pruning back to an established limb, or better yet, a bud that faces the direction you want a limb to develop.
Ensure that you properly dispose of all cuttings to prevent any potential diseases from remaining on the property. Additionally, remember to sanitize your tools with a solution of isopropyl alcohol before proceeding to another tree.
Once you understand this concept, you will begin to view the trees not merely as next year’s firewood, but as this year’s harvest.
Unsure whether you want to take on the task? Call Johnson Ops Tree Care, A Certified Arborist from our team will possess comprehensive knowledge about the proper techniques for tree trimming. Our Arborists are trained in tree pruning to ANSI standards.