Nice pruning job! I've been enjoying these great videos you put out, and would like to give back by sharing with you, a less-known trick for developing quality laterals with fruit buds very early on. All buds on a 1-year old branch will be vegetative buds. Most people wait until winter to perform their heading cuts. Pruning a 1-year old branch in Winter stimulates growth the upcoming year. Anything more than a 50% stimulates a lot of growth, the further back you cut, the more growth response you typically get. But if you prune that same branch at the end of the season in which it grew, something amazing happens. That same year, many of those vegetative buds will convert into fruit buds! You want to count the nodes starting from where that year's growth began (concentric circles at the base if growing from a 2-year old branch). Make your cut just above the 3rd or 4th node. Note that apples and pears typically have a whorl of leaves at the base of the current year's growth, do not count that one. Count distinct leaf nodes beyond that. Make sure you perform this cut after the branch has stopped growing for the year, which in your case might be August or September. There are ways to tell if the branch has stopped growing, I won't get into that here since that's covered elsewhere. The response you will see is, either no growth (ever), or possibly some very small tip growth that year (maybe an inch), but not growth ever, beyond that point. More importantly, you'll notice the remaining 3-4 vegetative nodes will become fruit nodes, and many times will flower that same year. Of course it's late in the year, so let it flower and carefully pinch it off. The following year, that branch will flower and if pollinated, bear fruit. This method is to produce quality fruiting laterals off of scaffolds. Do not choose overly-vigorous upright shoots. You want what's called weak-to-medium vigor. That makes for the best fruiting laterals. They'll be 12-18" long (ideally but shorter is ok), with several fruiting buds. This will typically be a 2-year old branch pruned in Winter the first year, with extension growth on a 1-year old branch you pruned in Summer using the method I described above. You could also do the same with a 1-year old branch coming off a scaffold, but it'll be a bit shorter and only have 3-4 buds on it, although you could leave up to 5-6 buds in that case. Of course you will thin to no more than one apple per fruit bud, since each fruit bud produces a cluster of flowers. The king bud in the center is typically the best one, but results may vary. Only leave about 3 apples on the lateral the first year they produce fruit. You want good spacing. The subsequent year that lateral. Check out the UC Santa Cruz channel's videos on pruning apple trees. He explains all these concepts MUCH better than I can in a simple YT comment.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm Forgot to mention that everything I suggested above is specific to apples and pears. As you know things like peaches will fruit on 1-year old wood so it wouldn't apply.
Thanks for the informative video. When you have the pruners on the fruiting buds, you should have a big red X! Also great to see the kitties “helping” out
Do you have a video on how you initially pruned the apple trees to shape them? If so, could you add the link to the description? Thanks for these awesome videos!
Good information. I have a small apple tree up in Show Low that is many years old and is perhaps half the size of yours. I won't be up there until May but I'll look to see if your recommended pruning cuts will help spur some growth.
Once you have your established structure and you are ready to encourage fruit production, have you had issues with having to tie up the main branches to prevent breakage? It seems like splitting would be easy with so many large branches growing radially from the same general area. Also the fruit can weigh the branches down if you’ve got really good production.
We do a couple of things to avoid that. First is the angle of the scaffold branch. They need to be somewhere around the 60 degree mark from the ground. That helps keep that fruit upright. Also, we thin the fruit VERY heavily after fruit set. Usually with apples it's no more than 2 apples/spur. That is then typically reduced to 1 before ripening season.
That is a trunk protectant to keep sun damage from killing the tree. I'll link to a video we did on that here for you with details; ruclips.net/video/WVh_IqHbXs0/видео.html
If you prune a spur off will it come back the next year? I just pruned my one of my apple trees and pruned off the spurs facing inward and under the scaffolding branches. I thought you were only supposed to keep the ones on the sides of the branches.
The short answer is maybe. Apple trees are always going to try to reproduce and as long as you're continuing to encourage that lower production you should see it put on more spurs. It may not be as many, but it should eventually push more out. Fingers crossed for you on this one! 🤞
Nice pruning job! I've been enjoying these great videos you put out, and would like to give back by sharing with you, a less-known trick for developing quality laterals with fruit buds very early on.
All buds on a 1-year old branch will be vegetative buds. Most people wait until winter to perform their heading cuts. Pruning a 1-year old branch in Winter stimulates growth the upcoming year. Anything more than a 50% stimulates a lot of growth, the further back you cut, the more growth response you typically get.
But if you prune that same branch at the end of the season in which it grew, something amazing happens. That same year, many of those vegetative buds will convert into fruit buds! You want to count the nodes starting from where that year's growth began (concentric circles at the base if growing from a 2-year old branch). Make your cut just above the 3rd or 4th node. Note that apples and pears typically have a whorl of leaves at the base of the current year's growth, do not count that one. Count distinct leaf nodes beyond that.
Make sure you perform this cut after the branch has stopped growing for the year, which in your case might be August or September. There are ways to tell if the branch has stopped growing, I won't get into that here since that's covered elsewhere.
The response you will see is, either no growth (ever), or possibly some very small tip growth that year (maybe an inch), but not growth ever, beyond that point. More importantly, you'll notice the remaining 3-4 vegetative nodes will become fruit nodes, and many times will flower that same year. Of course it's late in the year, so let it flower and carefully pinch it off. The following year, that branch will flower and if pollinated, bear fruit.
This method is to produce quality fruiting laterals off of scaffolds. Do not choose overly-vigorous upright shoots. You want what's called weak-to-medium vigor. That makes for the best fruiting laterals. They'll be 12-18" long (ideally but shorter is ok), with several fruiting buds. This will typically be a 2-year old branch pruned in Winter the first year, with extension growth on a 1-year old branch you pruned in Summer using the method I described above. You could also do the same with a 1-year old branch coming off a scaffold, but it'll be a bit shorter and only have 3-4 buds on it, although you could leave up to 5-6 buds in that case.
Of course you will thin to no more than one apple per fruit bud, since each fruit bud produces a cluster of flowers. The king bud in the center is typically the best one, but results may vary. Only leave about 3 apples on the lateral the first year they produce fruit. You want good spacing. The subsequent year that lateral.
Check out the UC Santa Cruz channel's videos on pruning apple trees. He explains all these concepts MUCH better than I can in a simple YT comment.
I appreciate the detailed explanation! You make a good point - the timing of pruning can really affect fruit production. Thank you for this!
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm Forgot to mention that everything I suggested above is specific to apples and pears. As you know things like peaches will fruit on 1-year old wood so it wouldn't apply.
Thanks for the informative video. When you have the pruners on the fruiting buds, you should have a big red X! Also great to see the kitties “helping” out
I agree, a big red X might have been helpful. Thanks for the feedback!
Wish you heavy production of golden dorset and Anna and many liters of very delicious and your favorit apple vine ❤❤❤
They really do make a very good apple wine!
Do you have a video on how you initially pruned the apple trees to shape them? If so, could you add the link to the description? Thanks for these awesome videos!
Here is a link to the video we did a few years back for establishing the tree structure;
ruclips.net/video/6aphVVPyMLY/видео.html
Great breakout! Hadn’t thought about a harvesting notch. Thx
It really does make all the difference at harvest time!
Looking forward to seeing the production
Stay tuned. We should see these coming off the tree sometime in June!
Thanks for another great video ❤
Glad you enjoyed this one. Pruning can be a challenge, so this type of content is usually one that a lot of folks find some use for.
🔥
🍎🍎🍏🍏
Glad you enjoyed this one!
Thank you.
Glad you enjoyed this one Pam!
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Teşekkürler Mesut!
Got to get pix to you on the Dorsett in bloom. !
Ours are still completely dormant. First flower on the FlordaPrince, but nothing else there either yet!
Good information. I have a small apple tree up in Show Low that is many years old and is perhaps half the size of yours. I won't be up there until May but I'll look to see if your recommended pruning cuts will help spur some growth.
I hope you see some good results from those pruning cuts!
Once you have your established structure and you are ready to encourage fruit production, have you had issues with having to tie up the main branches to prevent breakage? It seems like splitting would be easy with so many large branches growing radially from the same general area. Also the fruit can weigh the branches down if you’ve got really good production.
We do a couple of things to avoid that. First is the angle of the scaffold branch. They need to be somewhere around the 60 degree mark from the ground. That helps keep that fruit upright. Also, we thin the fruit VERY heavily after fruit set. Usually with apples it's no more than 2 apples/spur. That is then typically reduced to 1 before ripening season.
What is the white paint on the trunk of the tree for? Thank you
That is a trunk protectant to keep sun damage from killing the tree. I'll link to a video we did on that here for you with details;
ruclips.net/video/WVh_IqHbXs0/видео.html
If you prune a spur off will it come back the next year? I just pruned my one of my apple trees and pruned off the spurs facing inward and under the scaffolding branches. I thought you were only supposed to keep the ones on the sides of the branches.
The short answer is maybe. Apple trees are always going to try to reproduce and as long as you're continuing to encourage that lower production you should see it put on more spurs. It may not be as many, but it should eventually push more out. Fingers crossed for you on this one! 🤞