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[Lee Reich <lreich@hvc.rr.com>]

You'll probably write this off as academia vs real world . . . but research has shown that although summer pruning does not seem to stimulate much vegetative growth, that growth does actually occur -- the next year. So summer pruning is not generally more dwarfing than is dormant pruning, as is often alleged. Of course, in summer you do have the opportunity to prune regrowth, should it occur, again and again, all of which surely would have a more dwarfing effect.

Pruning for espalier was developed in northern Europe. Speaking, now, from personal observation, apples and pears pruned using European espalier techniques almost never respond here the way they do in Europe. As I point out in my book, The Pruning Book,  growing conditions in northern Europe are quite different from those of most of the US as far as summer and winter temperatures, rainfall patterns, and daylength, all of which could be responsible for those differences.

Lee Reich, PhD

http://www.leereich.com/

http://leereich.blogspot.com/

Books by Lee Reich:

A Northeast Gardener's Year

The Pruning Book

Weedless Gardening

Uncommon Fruits for Every Garden

Landscaping with Fruit

On Aug 11, 2009, at 5:38 PM, Alan Haigh wrote:

Pruning apples from mid-July on does not stimulate much vegetative growth and that growth is not noticeably tender in my experience.  Espaliers have always  been pruned in mid-summer.  I prune every work hour of almost every day from the first week of July sometimes through September and have never seen "tender" growth as a consequence.  Some of the big old apples I manage only get pruned in summer because winter and early spring just aren't long enough for me to get everything done (dam short days!).

 

My customers who get me only in summer actually probably get the most bang for their buck (although I do end up knocking off quite a few apples if it's the only pruning of the year).  Because it slows down regrowth, summer pruning means less pruning over all in the long term.

 

The danger of tender growth leaving all types of fruit trees more susceptable to winter kill do to insufficient hardening off is quite exaggerated in my opinion and observation.  The one time in my nursery that I saw a real impressive surge of late growth was when we got a lot of rain in mid August after a very dry June and July.

 

It seemed like everthing just let go of all that pent-up energy to grow (the water would also cause a sudden release of N.) and grew like a second spring.  The Japanese plums were the only things of all the species I grow that showed any ill affect at all, in spite of a very cold winter.  Even that damage was only to the late growing shoots themselves- all othere tissue hardened off as it should.  In other words, no important damage occured at all.

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