North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Mauch1@aol.com]

Well, our fruit group had a speaker last winter, and as part of his talk, he 
brought in an article on the "S" training.  Most of my trees are pruned to a 
"Vertical Axe/Slender Spindle" (I'm not sure that I'm clear on the difference 
between the two).  But I have a Newtown Pippin that had a few lower branches 
and had about 5 ft of top growth with no branches.  I had tried taking out a 
sliver of cambium above  buds to force breaking of new branch growth to no 
avail.  So my choices were to cut it back like you would with central leader 
or this "S" training.  So I tried the "S".  The tree has broken quite a few 
branches (mainly at the bends), and I'm
basically happy with it.  I do have one existing branch that is threatening 
to become a leader, but weighting/pruning should help with that.  I can't say 
when the tree will become productive, or whether the tree will ultimately do 
better than its neighbors.

Chris Mauchline
SE PA, zone 6
40° 5' N    75° 51'W
~650 ft elevation

<<
I've just read a fruit tree training article called Bending the Rules 
in the February 2002 issue of The Garden, the journal of the Royal 
Horticultural Society.  I searched the NAFEX list archives, and did a 
Google search but did not find any further information.

S-training was developed by commercial orchardists in South Africa, 
Netherlands and Belgium.  This article advocates its use by home 
gardeners.

The practitioner quoted in the article: Will Sibley, a freelance 
grafter and pruner in England, says S-training is attractive and a 
lot easier than traditional methods of espalier.  Trees on M9 
dwarfing rootstock are planted against a post and trained into an S 
shape during the first two years. From then on, pruning and training 
is minimal. Optimum production will be in four years, when apple 
trees will produce around 18 kg (40 lbs) annually.

It can also be used for nectarines, peaches, apricots, and plums, but 
not pears or cherries.

Have any of you tried this?
>>