This is the second year in the ground for these trees. I know that pruning them right now will pay big later, but I have no idea what “right” looks like. At the moment they look bushy, which I’m pretty sure is “wrong.”
Here’s Prok. Part of me thinks I should cut off 2 of the 3 branches on the right, and the other part is terrified at the idea.
I would let them grow wild and only prune off cross branches. I hardly prune my persimmon trees. I will trim off dead branches in early Spring and that about all.
I would pinch prune to create a dominant leader- pinching back the competition after selecting the leader. Trees ordered from nurseries are usually topped and need to be redirected to create a central leader tree. If you want a persimmon bush, don’t worry about it, but remove branches with inverted bark where they attach to the trunk. These are oversized branches with weak unions that may break later.
I have a young persimmon tree. I want to prune it to get a good structure but I want to be able to get few fruits too. I’m reading up on pruning persimmon and below link says:
“ Persimmons fruit from new growth that arises from the last few buds of the previous season’s growth . If the ends of all the new branches produced last season are pruned off, this will effectively remove all the fruiting wood.”
So pretty much if you prune off the tips, which is necessary to create a good structure, you are giving up all the possible fruit. Is this correct?
If you have a tree that never had fruit have a tendency to get bigger.A grafted tree that had sionwood from a older tree that had fruits, you can apply the Modify Central leader, like you do with apple trees. You can control the size. I have several that are only 7 ‘ tall that are 5 or 6 years old