Apple Tree Pruning

Apple trees are the most common trees planted in North east. Besides, providing fresh and flavorful fruit, apple trees can be a pleasing addition to the home landscape. To produce these results, gardeners must have to pay attention to annual training and pruning apple trees.

What is pruning?

Pruning means removing certain parts of the tree in order to regulate the desired shape and to produce high quality fruits with minimum interference with natural growth habits of the tree. Pruning apple trees should occur for quality and maximum apple productions.

What is training?

Training an apple tree begins when a tree is planted and continues throughout the life of the tree. Training means positioning the branches to ensure maximum fruit production from existing branches. Training an apple tree properly during its first few years can save many hours of difficult, corrective pruning as the tree ages.

Apple Tree Pruning vs. Apple Tree Training:

Many people rely on pruning apple trees to shape apple trees. Though, pruning offers many benefits, it limits gardener’s option to removing branches only.

Often, remaining branches aren’t in an ideal position for maximum apple production. Training, by contrast, allows the gardeners to shape the tree through branch positioning and pruning.

Limb positioning is very important because it determines whether the branch will produce primarily fruit or vegetation (see right side picture). When branches grow straight, they produce mostly vegetative growth and very little fruit. By contrast, branches that grow straight out from the apple tree are very fruitful, but produce little new vegetative growth. The ideal limb position is about 30° above horizontal, creating a 60° crotch angle. This allows maximum apple production while still promoting growth of new wood for future fruiting.

Pruning should be used to open “windows” to allow light to penetrate throughout the tree. When all of the leaves are exposed to more light, the tree is able to produce higher quality apple. However, be careful not to remove too many branches, as pruning apple tree can stimulate excess regrowth. When a portion of a branch is removed, the tree responds by producing new growth. Often three or four branches will grow where one grew before, resulting “grow and cut” cycle. While excess regrowth can be minimized through proper cuts and by cutting into the older wood were possible, it cannot be entirely avoided.

Pruning Goals and Timing

There are two goals when pruning apple trees:

• 1. On young trees to encourage a strong and solid framework.
• 2. On mature trees to maintain the shape and encourage fruit production.

Regular pruning of apple trees is necessary to promote more fruit. There are two pruning seasons for apple.
a) Summer Pruning and b) Winter Pruning.
Summer and winter pruning of apple trees have different results on the nature of the apple trees future growth.

From Pruning apple trees blog:

• Planting Apple Trees

• Growing Apple Trees

• Apple Tree Diseases

• Columnar Apple Trees

• General rules for Pruning Apple Trees

• How to Prune Young Trees

• Pruning Old or Neglected Trees