Been hearing a lot of mention of people pinching off new growth on things like apples and pears. I know with figs pinching is supposed to stimulate fruit development but what does it accomplish on apple and other fruit trees?
I’ve heard it in the context of new bench grafts but also when talking about more mature trees to stop growth in some places and stimulate it in others.
Can someone explain?
I don’t really know anything about it. I usually cut many feet off each branch 2 or 3 times a year!
Drew- is that strictly to control size?
I planted a bare root black gold cherry in march and it’s in serious overdrive. It seems to be growing like a weed. I’m not harvesting any fruit off of it this year so I thought I’d just let it grow as much as it wanted to and then prune it next dormant season. Or would it be better to prune it during summer. I’d like to encourage more branching.
I pinch to steer growth in “trees in training”. This includes steering the growth of scaffolds by keeping the growing tip headed in a straight line from the trunk and from from being dominated by a lateral. A straight branch is an efficient one. A well trained tree doesn’t have zigzagging scaffolds.
The same thing goes with even younger trees to maintain dominance of a central leader. When a sapling tree is cut down in height several buds form at the cut- pinching is the most efficient way to grow the trunk back up with a straight spine.
Then there is pinching of shoots on espaliers, or similarly trained trees, where you pinch back annual shoots several times during spring and early summer to force the formation of a fruit spur.
The summer pruning yes, as trees are at a point I don’t want them any larger. Prune for shape in the winter.
With cherry trees it’s best to prune when dry during mid-summer. So I would do it then to shape and control size. You can prune in early spring, but the less times the better. The trees are fungal/bacterial magnets. If spring pruning do a copper spray afterwards. Trim all branches of 1/3 to 1/2 of new growth. Sweet cherries on dwarfing rootstock tend to cluster fruit buds at tips. Not enough leaf to fruit ratio if unpruned and you will get small cherries.
Pulling branches of apple horizontal makes them revert to a fruiting mode, but is also often results in multiple vigorous suckers. Pinching off these suckers turns them into fruit buds, which calms down the tree’s vertical habit.
Wow. Seems like pinching can accomplish many different things.
Below are two apple grafts I have growing now. Is there any reason to pinch off the tips of the lateral growths in this case?
I would and do routinely in my nursery. You dont have any need for two or more shoots to be competing to be the central leader. Also while those side shoots are too low to become permanent scaffolds, by pinching they can still contribute to the growth of the overall tree this growing season.
So I should prune it all the way back to the rootstock/scion and not just the tip?
No. You should pinch the tip to stop elongation of those limbs but leave most of the leaves to feed the tree and help it grow. At some point in the future, when those limbs are an inconsequential portion of the tree (or at least don’t have leaves on them) you will prune them off completely.
Is this a case of what you are talking about? This is a horizontal branch on my apple tree and you can see 2 branches of new growth growing vertically. If I pinch this growth the remaining portion will revert to fruit buds? How far back would I pinch it?
Yep, prune them back to three leaves.
Resurrecting an old thread but my trees really are in overdrive for the first time since I’ve planted them. Is this a situation where I should pinch some of those vertical shoots coming off the horizontal limb I have tied down?
Yes, prune them down low to about three leaves. You’ll have to do it a couple more times by the end of the season.
I always wondered if there were some magic about that “three leaves” advice- why not four? Why not two? But now, it’s “about three leaves”. You know, I’m glad to know it- it was kinda bugging me wondering “why three?”!
:-)M
C. Lee Calhoun taught me it. It’s kind lf like the four slits you make in a pie crust; three to vent it, one more because that’s the way mama used to do it.
3 leaves? Because it is not a technique used in commercial production, so it is not a research based recommendation as far as I know. If it is, the research must have been done in Europe or Britain, where espaliers are taken seriously. In the U.S., last I checked, university degrees in ornamental horticulture don’t even include a single course on fruit trees, let alone espalier fruit trees. Maybe at U.C. Davis, if anywhere.
