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nafex - Re: [NAFEX] apple tree pruning

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  • From: Terence Bradshaw <tblists@pshift.com>
  • To: nafex@lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [NAFEX] apple tree pruning
  • Date: Sun, 05 Feb 2006 13:18:34 -0500

Jason:

Save yourself trouble down the road and lop them off with a dutch cut. That's a slanted cut where you leave a longer stub at the bottom of the branch and cut the top all the way to the collar. This allows for adventitious buds on the underside to break, allowing the limb to renew at a good crotch angle. Of course it the limb is rally quite low (knee high or less) you should lop it off flush. In your third leaf you are still establishing the framework of the tree, so you don't want to further choke that leader now.

Hope that helps,

TerryB

From: Jason MacArthur Subject: [NAFEX] apple tree pruning
To: nafex@lists.ibiblio.org
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I have a few dwarf apple trees going into 3rd leaf with lower tier branches which are almost equal to the size of the trunk. In fact, the trunk narrows significantly above these branches- clearly they are draining significant resources from the central leader. Reading through the pruning literature there seems to be a great deal of conflicting advice on how to deal with a situation like this, from "never prune a branch until it's fruited" to "don't bother growing a whole side of the tree you will only need to cut out later".

The longer I wait the larger these branches get, so I am wondering what to do. Is there any way to significantly slow them down enough to allow the trunk to regain dominance? Or should I hack the tree back to a whip and start all over?

Thanks and happy growing,

Jason MacArthur
Marlboro, Vt.





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