North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Scott Smith <scott@cs.jhu.edu>]

I have many high density plantings, primarily trees spaced around 3'  
apart in rows 10' apart.  Pruning at least twice per summer plus  
thinning pruning in the winter is needed.  Without enough pruning you  
will get trees that are too dense and that in turn can reduce the  
amount of fruit and bring on diseases.  It has taken me several years  
to learn how to keep the trees properly balanced; I have found the  
European plums the hardest to control and the dwarf apples the  
easiest.  I use a modified vase system on most trees - it is a vase  
but with from 1-3 scaffolds only.  With only one scaffold the vase  
becomes a spindle of sorts.

Scott
Maryland z6/7