How and when to prune fruit trees in spring

The sad stories of summer residents that the purchased seedling only pleased with good harvests of large fruits for a couple of years, and then the fruiting deteriorated sharply, can often be heard. In such situations, gardeners blame a poor-quality variety, bad weather, and look for reasons in other external factors. If you look at such a tree up close, you can see a thickened crown, many old shoots, bare branches – all this is evidence of incorrect or completely absent pruning. Pruning of fruit trees and shrubs is the most important part of care, responsible for the growth and health of the plant, its yield, quality and size of fruits. It is necessary to trim the garden several times a year, but the most important stage of this process occurs in the spring.

How and when to prune fruit trees in spring will be discussed in this article. Here will be listed the basic rules for cropping, its types and methods of implementation.

When to prune a garden

First of all, the gardener must understand that any, even the most correct and gentle, pruning is an injury to the tree. Therefore, it is very important to choose the right time for this event, when the plant will be less traumatized and will be able to quickly heal the wounds.

In principle, it is necessary to prune the garden several times a year. Some gardeners recommend starting pruning fruit trees and berry bushes at the end of winter, as soon as severe frosts recede.

Spring pruning of fruit trees and shrubs is the most important part of garden care. It is in spring that old and dry branches are removed, damaged and diseased parts of the plant are cut out, the crown of young ones is formed and old trees in the garden are rejuvenated.

The optimal time for pruning an orchard is in early spring – in most regions, these are practiced from mid-March to early April. After winter, the gardener should go out into the garden as soon as the snow begins to melt, around the end of February, early March. This is the best time to inspect trunks and crowns, remove winter shelters and protection from rodents, and cut dry and broken branches.

When the air temperature stabilizes, and the thermometer does not fall below -5 degrees, you can do a major spring pruning of trees. This must be done in dry weather in the absence of strong winds.

Fundamental rules

When you first prune your garden, it is very important not to harm the trees. It is better to first familiarize yourself with the special literature, consult with more experienced gardeners, see a photo of pruning schemes or a video lesson from professionals.

After that, you should prepare the necessary tools: a garden knife, a saw, a pruner, a garden pitch for covering large wounds. The tool before work is recommended to be disinfected and sharpened well.

To make things right you need to follow these recommendations:

1. The cuts should be even and smooth. If the cut does not immediately turn out to be perfect, you need to trim and clean it with a sharp knife.
2. Young shoots are recommended to be cut above the buds that are on the outside of the branch. The cut should be oblique, perform it from the center of the tree outward.
3. The shoots, which are a continuation of the trunk, after pruning should remain 20-30 cm longer than the others.
4. If the tree is weakened by disease or other factors, it should be cut as short as possible – by 2-3 buds.
5. Normally developing fruit trees are best cut above the fifth or sixth eye.
6. When the fruit variety is vigorous, you can apply a long pruning – leaving 7-8 buds on the shoots.
7. If the branch needs to be removed completely, it is cut close to the trunk, leaving no stumps.
8. When cutting thick branches, they begin to file them from below, so that, suddenly breaking off, they do not damage the bark of the cut. Then the same file is made from above, connecting the two cut lines into a ring.
9. It is better not to touch the trees frozen in the current winter, but to prune them only next spring.
10. The secateurs during pruning are held so that its narrow part is directed towards the escape.
11. The conductor – the central shoot – should be only one, all its “competitors” should be cut out.
12. Shoots of small diameter must be cut so that the lower edge of the cut is at the bottom of the kidney, and the upper edge coincides with the top of the eye.
13. It is important to stick to the same pruning scheme throughout the life of a tree. For most fruit trees with normal growth, a sparse-tiered pruning scheme is most suitable, which involves the formation of a powerful frame from skeletal branches.
14. While the tree is young, its pruning should not be excessive, as this can lead to stunting of the plant and its deformation.

Methods and schemes

The pruning technique chosen by the gardener at the time of planting the seedling should depend on several factors. The most important of them is the age of the tree and its appearance. If viewed globally, then All methods of pruning fruit trees are divided into three types:

1. Thinning. This method involves the complete removal of entire branches, where the shoots are cut close to the trunk or larger branch from which they branch. Thinning does not affect the size of the tree in any way, it is necessary to reduce its mass. You should not get carried away with such pruning, because it does not stimulate the formation of young branches and increased fruiting. The thinning method is used to remove diseased, dry, old and excess shoots.

   

2. Non-selective pruning. This technique is applicable to all young shoots, which are shortened by making an oblique cut over the bud. The non-selective method is used both for crown formation and tree rejuvenation. The result of this method is the active stimulation of dormant buds and the growth of new shoots.
3. Selective pruning. The shoot in this case is cut to the kidney or to the side branch. It is important here that the diameter of the remaining side branch is half the thickness of the removed shoot. Young shoots up to 3 mm thick are cut into one eye. The selective method helps to reduce the height of a shrub or tree without disturbing its shape. In other cases, it is better not to use the technique, as it is very aggressive and will negatively affect the amount of the crop.

Crown formation

Formative pruning is essential for all young trees. It starts from the second year of the seedling’s life, and lasts at least 4-5 years. Knowing the characteristics of some fruit trees will help the gardener to correctly form the crown of a tree. So, apple trees and pears, for example, bear fruit on perennial shoots. And the fruits of plums and cherries appear on two-year-old branches a couple of years after planting.

The most common formative pruning options are non-tiered and sparsely-tiered. Most often, gardeners use a sparse-tiered scheme for pruning cherries, cherry plums, plums. Such a tree looks like a trunk and side branches extending from it at intervals of 20-25 cm, the number of which usually does not exceed ten.

To properly form the crown of a young tree, you must follow the instructions:

1. Annual seedlings without side branches in spring should be shortened to 80 cm. At least ten buds should remain on the conductor (this will be the central shoot or tree trunk). From these eyes, in subsequent years, lateral shoots will grow – tiers of the tree. The emerging leaves on the stem are cut off to a height of 40 cm from the ground.
2. Two-year-old trees leave 2-4 shoots – over time, they form the lower tier of skeletal branches. You need to leave the strongest and healthiest branches.
3. In the third spring, it is necessary to form a second tier, its skeletal branches should be 70-100 cm from the base of the first tier. In the second tier, only two shoots are left, located at an angle of 45 degrees: the first is 50-60 cm from the trunk, the second is 40-45 cm from the first. Shoots growing between these two tiers are shortened by half.

   

4. The next few prunings will consist of thinning the crown by cutting out branches growing deep into the tree, twisted or weak shoots. If during this period the gardener notices a stronger growth of a conductor competitor, then the current conductor will need to be cut into a ring. Otherwise, all competitors are removed.
5. Formative pruning is completed when a tall tree reaches a height of four meters (optimally 2 m for dwarfs). At this stage, it is necessary to remove the conductor above the upper shoot – this will stop the growth of the tree and complete the formation of its crown. The conductor should be cut into a ring.

Mature tree care

For the health of the garden and abundant fruiting, it is important to prune not only young, but also adult trees that have been actively bearing fruit for several years. Pruning adult fruit trees is as follows:

• removal of old, dry and diseased shoots – annual sanitary pruning;
• thinning of a thickened crown in order to better ventilate and illuminate branches and fruits;
• in trees with a pyramidal crown (for example, pears), it is necessary to lower all the growing shoots down, that is, remove the branches growing upwards;
• the rest of the trees with shoots lowered down require the removal of all branches directed downwards – they leave shoots whose growth is directed towards the top;
• to rejuvenate old trees, cut out the upper part of the trunk and thin out the crown well.

Conclusion

It is very difficult for a novice gardener to understand in words how to properly prune a fruit tree or shrub. That’s why each beginner is recommended to pick up a pruning scheme before the onset of spring, get acquainted with the technology of its implementation, in order to competently ennoble their garden with the onset of heat.

Spring pruning is very important for the health and productivity of the orchard, so it should not be neglected. You can learn more about how to do it in this video.