Another advice would be to not lay down the growing tips horizontal onto your wire until the scaffold has reached its desired size. Keep the last third of the shoot or more growing in an more upward angle and lay the shoot down step by step as it grows. With experience you will know how long you can let it grow rather upward and still force it down later. You cannot wait too long since the scaffold then can become too rigid. But I would say thats the lesser evil. You can still force it down using hinge cuts. Bend the shoots in their vegetative state, cause then they are much more flexible and less likely to break. If you fix the shoot down horizontally too early that too will stunt growth severly. Especially in the lower scaffolds you absolutely need to keep some vigor. Even later on you probably will need some vigor to replace dying spurs etc
Helpful Espalier Resources:
Here is an old GF thread on Lorette’s book (free through Cornell)
That Cornell link didn’t work for me, but this one did
A helpful summary in Michael Phillips’s Holistic Orchard on pp 89-93
Also, I like Espalier Fruit Planting for Northern Gardens, by Perry & Getter (2022). I first heard Dr Perry on an Orhard People podcast:
Summer pruning 2025. Trees continue to be vigorous. Several shots of lowest scaffold were 5+’.
Before (after I’d removed ~3’ from top):
After:
I’ve found that releasable cable tie work really well for ties.
I really don’t want a 5th tier- any advice on how to stop upward growth where it is now?
Snip out the center vertical and keep it short when it trys to come back.
Have you tried bending the leader over as another way to reduce vigor?