An old apple grower from Normandie, who wrote a very technical book on
pruning (in French), with illustrations describing every possible
combination, in fact too detailed for practical application unless you want
to do a phD on the subject of pruning, made one incredible comment on summer
pruning: "Summer pruning is done by pinching with thumb and forefinger"...
It prevents or twarth unwanted growth such as suckers, and other branches
which you would definitely prune off next Spring. This way the tree spends
its energy constructively (for your purpose) without spending energy on
useless development. What it says basically is that in Summer pruning you
mostly work on green growth before it lignifies and harden off. For
instance, the suckers are told not to grow when you remove the tip end...
The reaction of the tree is then to consolidate its position... You end up
cajoling the tree instead of brutalizing it, while minimizing Spring
pruning. The tree need not do major repairs to its wood... in Summer
pruning, green branches can repair damages to their limbs almost overnight.
I am really not an expert on pruning, but I would like to bring up the
interesting perspective that I found in this book. We have a tendancy to cut
off with shears, knifes, and a multitude of other tools... making it more
difficult for ourselves, while taking an attitude of working against instead
of working within ... The time not spent dealing with the tools is time
spent looking closely at the the phenomenon of growth.
It is clear that this approach is not for large orchardist with thousands of
trees. It is also more difficult once the tree is big enough to require a
ladder.
Just a words for thought, in this day and age, where we need to rediscover
collaboration...
Hélène, zone 4
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Friday, June 06, 2008 9:53 PM
Subject: Re: [NAFEX] Summer Pruning
Maybe I'm wrong, but I would suspect that in a hot dry climate, summer
pruning would aleviate stress on the tree rather than create more.
You're taking away leaf surface area that is otherwise respirating and
causing water loss in the plant. If it stimulates new growth that hasn't
hardened off I could see how that might be less than ideal, but I don't
think the tree is going to put much energy into that if water is an
issue.
That's very interesting, Michael. I hadn't thought of it in that way.
I guess I just thought that pruning would always be stressful, and that
each cut would have to be healed (meanwhile leaking fluids?). But I
suppose a pruning cut on a green, growing twig would seal itself pretty
quickly. Obviously, I still wouldn't want to do it on a particularly hot
and windy day, but maybe I've been looking at this wrong.
Thanks for the observation!
Bill
Lincoln, NE (zone 5)
--
Invisible Pink Unicorns are beings of great spiritual power. We know
this because they are capable of being invisible and pink at the same
time. Like all religions, the Faith of the Invisible Pink Unicorns is
based upon both logic and faith. We have faith that they are pink; we
logically know that they are invisible because we can't see them. -
Steve Eley
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