Pruning some old damson plum trees
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- Опубликовано: 16 апр 2020
- Julia pruning a 25 year old damson plum tree (variety Merryweather). Plums should only be pruned during a period of strong new growth, for us that means mid April to early May. This is because of the risk of microbial disease entering pruning wounds. We don;t think wound paint makes much if any difference. We have lost most of our plum trees from boring insects and bacterial plum canker, we won;t be replacing them, which is a pity as they can be lovely trees. One variety, Blue Tit, seems to have resistance and we hope to report on this in the future.
It’s so good to see videos from you again I think you’re responsible for me now having almost 60 varieties of apples in our orchard. Our plums had a very hard freeze and now they are all dark gray. But we have many apples still doing great. I feel like watching your videos I am spending time with old friends.
Thank you for this. It's very comforting right now.
Hope you are ok.
Its ashame about the disease issues with the plums. I remember a video from a few years ago when y'all were picking plums. Those trees full of plums were one of the prettiest videos you've put up.
Good to see you kids back in the orchard! If I may be so bold as to suggest you take a bit of the plum wood you trimmed and smoke a nice roast of pork and pair with a bottle of your favorite cider from Dabinett Apple's would be lovely!
Cheers from Upstate, NY
None of us are really comfortable with the cutting off of dangly bits with loppers!
Good morning Steve and julia, just having a morning coffee and heading out for a day of pruning in a 35 tree orchard inspired by you and your orchard. Hoping for a good season this year most of the trees are 8 or 9 years old ,with a mix of new and older varieties planted on mm111 . Thank you for being you and posting videos. All the best
Its wonderful to see you are well and back to posting a bit. I always enjoy your videos, I watched just about all of them. I have to tell you, you have had a great influence on me and have inspired me to plant an orchard of my own. I now have a bit over 100 trees, 95% of which I grafted using your techniques. After a long day I love to take a quiet stroll through the trees. Thanks for your inspiration and all you have taught me.
Stephen, great to see you back at the Orchard. Like many I have grafted many trees based on your recommendations including favourites such Orleans Reinette, sunset, Kidds Orange red, Egremont russet, Ribston, May Queen , Suntan , etc etc. I hope you will be able post some films of your beautiful orchard over the coming weeks thru the blossom and how the orchard develops over the summer. Fantastic to see you back!
I have a Methley plum tree in my backyard orchard. Plum tree is a must have tree in a orchard!
I pruned my parents plum trees, which are Kea Plum, in midsummer pretty much around the summer solstice. One of them had become over-large and had stopped fruiting well, the other which I think originated as a root sucker from the first, had hardly fruited at all but was growing away to over 12ft. This year, both trees have much more blossom than last year, although still only some branches have it. I'm thinking that midsummer again will make it easiest to see how much more to take off this year.
Excellent
This, perhaps, doesn't seem particularly interesting to you but to your viewers it is. Thanks much appreciated.
Wonderful to see new videos from you. Again, please, the brand of saw blade you prefer..?
Thank you, Doctor.
We use Silky saws (used to be called Silky Fox) exclusively. Made in Japan and expensive, the teeth are arranged in such a way and the steel so thin that the saw pulls through the wood with little effort, leaving a very clean cut. The particular model Julia is using here is a Silky Gomtaro with fine teeth.
Pruneau d'Agen? never had the chance to try...
but the fresh plum Prune d'ente is small but very sweet and flavourful.
cold in winter opens cracks in plum trunks .cankers and wood eating insects move in
Have you been able to experiment at all with prunus rootstocks for canker resistance at your orchard?
No. It would be worth doing, but we aren't the people to do it. We're old, and have other priorities. But if anyone knows anything on the subject, please post it here. Our plums are mostly on St Julien root stock, the main one in use, but some are on their own roots (grown from suckers) and suffer just the same.
@@stephenhayesuk I understand everyone has limited time and needs to prioritize things. One idea I had was using local native wild plum stock from hedgerows or roadsides if you have any of those. Here in the states I grafted a few damsons onto wild plum stock as an experiment. They took well and grew incredibly well for 2 years now but I'm seeing the trunk sizes are rapidly mismatching. Wild plums grow as shrubby thorny thickets here while the damson wants to be a tree so the graft is twice the size of the stock by now. Looks kind of funny but I'll let it grow for now to see if it fruits.
A coup de grace has nothing to do with a cup of grease unless you're thinking of screwing the tree to high heaven.
My bad pun. Of course, the French term 'coup de grace' means the blow of mercy, a bullet to the brain or equivalent putting a fatally wounded animal or person out of their misery.
let me send you some scion from romanian plums. They were bead for resistance. you do not need to spray them.
Wats ya fave damson
And anytjing yiu recimend to make brandy
And any to make prune ?
We only grow one variety of damson, Merryweather. I recommend it as it's quite a large one, easy to pick and a good cropper, good flavour. But I can't say it's the best as I've never grown any other.
It is illegal to make brandy or any other distilled alcoholic drink in England unless you register with the government, obey regulations and pay tax . If i did distil coder or plums to make brandy, I wouldn't tell you! But in fact I don't.
Never made prunes. I think you need a higher sugar level in a warmer climate.
That reminds me, I brought back about 10 250g bags of Pruneaux d'Agen from my last trip to France in my, and we haven't eaten half of them yet!!! Must get some.
@@stephenhayesuk wow did not no its illegal, thats natzi gestapo treatment, im making my own for personal use, screw them and there taxes lol thanks for reply. I'm going with farliegh fir brandy n drunes 😃 🙂
You could try making with a type of Damson gin
with your plumbs instead since you cant distill them.
Always thought meant to prune plums mid summer to stop disease... I may be wrong
I lot of it depends on where you live. Different areas have different diseases that are active at different times.
big cuts open wounds also plum tree cambium soft not like apple