For a smaller plum variety like Shiro, or I guess for all the cherry plum types as well as pluerry, do you still thin as vigorously as for larger fruit?
I’d think you could think of the branch like a pond that can support a certain number of pounds of fish…either a handful of large ones or many small ones.
How do you handle the smaller variety fruits? Do you leaves some branches completely alone and let it do what it wants?
I actually have to make that decision for the first time this spring.
The smaller fruits I don’t really thin. Shiro for example I sometimes have to thin to keep the branches from breaking though. My stone fruit drop a lot from natural drop and insect damage.
I thin those but leave a larger number of fruits just like you suggest.
Thanks Robert. I’ll probably thin a few branches and leave some to compare.
Assuming none of the many disease/pest possibilities don’t do a number on mine, it would be wonderful to get something approaching those catalog photos of, say, a loaded golden Shiro branch!
I just try to avoid having the fruit touch one another.
I thin Shiro drastically most of the time; and they grow larger than my other Oriental plum varieties: Santa Rosa, Sweetheart, Red Heart.
I had a Shiro plum when I lived in Killeen Texas that would produce a good bloom every 2nd or 3rd year.
If I didn’t thon it there would be hundreds of poor tasting practically inedible fruit.
The first time I thinned it I took off around 75% of the fruit and it made a huge difference.
The fruit more than doubled the size and the fruit was 100% edible with a very good acid to sugar ratio.
Shiro has to be thinned to get edible fruit.
I had a friend with a Mexican Plum who said when he thinned it the fruit got a little bigger,but the eating quality improved immensely.
I think/know the biggest problem with apricots and the number of people who say they never had a good apricot,who have grown apricots is,they never thin the trees enough.
Friends who had me taste their apricots fresh off the tree claiming to have good apricots usually get mad at me when I tell them their apricots taste horrible.
Last year several of them got to taste several of my apricots and they were amazed at the flavor and sugar content(22-28 brix).
The sad thing is,several of these people have been growing apricots all their lives.
I thin as much as 80% of my apricots off the trees and this shoukd be done to all the naturally small stone fruit.IMO
Thanks for your input @greendumb .
It all makes sense. The fruit is fighting for resources and that includes things that affect taste.
I think those who don’t thin apricots…perhaps they didn’t control the size of their tree for accessibility and the time it would take to thin isn’t palatable for them. You get used to what you have taste wise I’d say.
Since apricots aren’t grown for many hundreds of miles (thousands) commercially from where I live, the store bought ones are horrible. When I’ve traveled to New Mexico or Utah in summer and eaten them off the tree…wow!
I even ate my own (2 fruit) Katy apricot last spring…delicious. I don’t know why that tree didnt bloom this spring.
What brix level do you get with your thinned Shiro?
I thin in stages, not sure what percentage. Probably more than 50%.
I know of a shiro tree that never gets thinned but always has amazing fruit. It’s branches break a lot each year later in the season though. I’m in Washington state where it rains a lot and I’m not even sure if that tree ever gets watered by humans but the fruit tastes great though.
I thin but only because i like the unripe plums 
and only unripe plums.
Do you make plum syrup or plum catsup with the under ripe fruit?
No, i just wash them, split them or cut them up, remove the seeds, stick them in a mortar/pestal thing and add Thai chilli flakes, fish sauce, msg, salt and sometimes a tiny bit of Johnny’s seasoning salt 
deliciously sour and crunchy with that tinge of astringency sometimes.
I do the same with unripe blueberries too but i don’t use seasoning salt on those. Only the typical chilli flakes, salt, msg, fish sauce. Also unripe Blueberries are extraordinarily good when you smash them with seasoned, grilled fish. I’m salivating thinking of it haha. This is the true reason why i have so many blueberry plants… with me, half of them don’t make it to ripening but now i have mini me and mini me but in dog form. They all love the ripened ones more so I gotta make sure there’s enough to go around for everyone to be satisfied 
i do this with red huckleberries too but it takes so long to pick enough of these haha
@Melon
A very SE Asian way to use them. I like it. You could probably do a chutney as well. Extracts. Pickled. Umeshu - plum wine.
One day i hope to grow myself up to pickling them. I’ll have to have enough of them to do it though cause there’s been a few times where I’ve cleared out a tree all by myself before anything ripened.
I’m worst than a squirrel when it comes to plums cause I’ll gather for anyone who likes them unripe too before realizing there won’t be any ripe ones for the year
I’ll learn self control one day
I take your observation with a grain of salt, since you like unripe fruit, you may not mind unripe qualities in “ripe” fruit.
I do not thin. I let the squirrels thin so I have a chance of getting some at the end of season.
Unfortunately I did not have a refractometer at that time,but if I were to guess, I would say it was between 16-22. I know Shiro at its prime can easily get in the 20’s.
Shibumi,thinning apricots,especially when they have a heavy set,are seen by most as an impossibility to thin because there can be thousands of fruitlets in an adult tree.
Last year I spent over 8 hours thinning one apricot tree to what I consider a perfect fruit load,and that was one out of 13 trees.
This is the main reason,I believe,that backyard growers never get to taste their fruit in its prime flavor profile.