This weekend SM and I are going to tackle pruning our fruit trees.
I always pull up a video on YouTube to remind me how to do this.
Last year was the first year we pruned our then 4yo apple trees. I remember being told by a fellow blogger to be "ruthless" when pruning and she was right.
We got our first apple harvest back in August and we were thrilled.
We do have a 2 yo peach tree that I bought at the end of the season at Walmart. I didn't figure out until later why it was so cheap.
The above video discusses that properly pruned peach trees have scaffold branches that grow at a 45 degree angle so the tree can handle the fruit load.
The center of the tree should always be open for air circulation.
Our peach tree pretty much looks like a regular old tree with a main vertical branch right up the inside.
We knew about this last year and pondered if we should remove it then but I wimped out and told SM to leave it alone.
Not this year.
SM will be breaking out the saw today to remove that center branch. Hopefully the tree will survive.
I also wanted to share with you a great idea for all those pruned fruit tree branches.
Instead of tossing them onto the burn pile, force them to bloom in the house instead. I pulled up this "How To" article on Dave's Garden as a tutorial.
I'm going to give this a shot with both my peach and apple trimmings. You can also do this with any spring flowering shrub like forsythias.
Take pictures of your forced branches. Wish I had trees to do that with.
ReplyDeleteHeck with bringing pruned branches in . . . our whole trees would like to come in out of the snow threatening to smother them! ;o}
ReplyDeleteHave fun with your pruning job today. We won't be doing same for a while yet. Maybe MONTHS if this snow doesn't stop. 'Course, a morning temperature of 6° doesn't make for any melting either!
What a blessing to have apple and peach trees. You'll be a happy summer camper!
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