Questions not deserving of a whole thread

Derby42 · February 20, 2018, 12:10am

I think I top worked this peach in 2015 , any way here it is with a new variety and the stumps where I removed the old peach variety

Hillbillyhort · February 20, 2018, 1:32am

Hamebone
I don’t grow a lot of peach trees , but here is my opinion about cutting 3-4 inch branches.;
Likely they will not properly heal. And may eventually be the doom of the tree.

However , I consider peach trees to have a short productive life anyway .
You may get several good years of production yet, before the un healed cut
Becomes “the” problem. and this may coincide with the productive life
( but some what shortened). Of the tree.

Mostly I have been glad I have made bigger cuts,to get a tree in the shape I wanted it to be. Some don’t heal , and rot.
Of course it’s best to have that long term " vision" from day one , to avoid making those large cuts latter on.

hambone · February 20, 2018, 1:40am

@Hillbillyhort Thanks Hill. Yeah I’m thinking the time to make it vase shape is long gone. It’s not my tree, belongs to a friend who neglected it. Neglecting fruit trees seems to be the National Pasttime.

MisterGuy · February 20, 2018, 11:28am

I’m not an expert, and I definitely can’t tell you if it will die ANYWAY, BUT I do know: A tree can heal over a 3 to 4 inch cut IF you graft onto it. It’ll heal over in a year if you graft three shoots onto the top, two if you just put on on each side. You can always graft itself onto itself, let the branch heal, and then stub off the much smaller grafts.

hambone · February 20, 2018, 12:58pm

@MisterGuy How tricky is peach grafting? I’ll look into this, thanks.

MisterGuy · February 20, 2018, 2:09pm

Officially peaches are tricky. I had extraordinarily good luck last year with the methods described in the thread here:
Basic Tips For New Grafters #2: Different Grafts (Discussion Needed) - #66 by MisterGuy

That was maybe more like a two inch maybe two and a half inch trunk.

zendog · February 20, 2018, 4:22pm

So it looks like I have crown gall on 3 apple trees I grafted onto G969 last year and grew in pots. I expect it must have been there when I got them, since there were some small bumps on the rootstock when I received it and they grew in Promix BX which seems like an unlikely source of crown gall.

Anyway, after getting over the disappointment with my 3 new trees, I realize I need to toss them out. But I’m wondering if I can cut off the tops for scion wood. Would there be the chance of the gall bacteria in the tops or should they be okay. Since I don’t have either scions on hand and I need to make some new trees, I was hoping they might be clean, but don’t want to waste my time.

Thoughts?

Hillbillyhort · February 20, 2018, 5:22pm

Scionwood should be ok, especially if taken high on the tree.
Above the rain splash zone ,
You could wipe with a 10% bleach solution before taking cuttings, as an added precaution

zendog · February 20, 2018, 6:35pm

Thanks. I’m glad to hear the trees aren’t a total loss.

I better go cut those scions right now since it is 70+ outside today and my peach buds have gone silvery already.

VSOP · February 20, 2018, 7:16pm

Where did you get the 969 from? Have you told the Nursery? They might not make it right, but perhaps they should be informed so this problem can be brought to their attention and hopefully fixed.

Olpea · February 20, 2018, 7:41pm

Here is a pic of a 4+" scaffold removal on a peach. The tree is 14 years old. I probably removed the scaffold 9 years ago, and it still hasn’t completely healed.

I cut it flush to the trunk (probably leaving the collar). And I painted the naked wound a couple times with copper to preserve the wood so it would have time to callus.

As it turns out, the tree is getting close to the end of it’s productive life, so it was probably a waste of time to paint copper anyway.

Here, peach trees need not be managed for longevity. They are easy to propagate, quick to come into production, and have a short productive life anyway. One could think of them as really really long lived annuals.

zendog · February 20, 2018, 7:51pm

I called the nursery once and left a message describing the issue and hoping to talk to someone about what to do since I had already planted one tree. I was still open to the idea that maybe it was something like you see on M111 with the pre-root growths and wanted to know if there was anything in the G969 growth habit that might indicate it.

When I didn’t hear back I called again today and connected with someone. They seemed busy and not very interested and said that I could take my chances that the one I planted would be okay or remove it. Since it is close to 2 healthy trees I’ll be removing it and the dirt around it later today and the other 2 trees still in their pots I’ll just cut the tops off for scion and toss the rest. I had explained they were grown in Promix BX which I didn’t think was likely to carry the crown gall, but they just said they couldn’t tell me where it might have come from but could have been in the potting mix. Since they don’t currently list G969 and I can’t say for sure they were infected when I go them, I won’t mention them by name. But based on the response I won’t be using them again. Just wish I’d gone with the G890 instead…

VSOP · February 20, 2018, 8:34pm

Hunh. I’m disappointed by that response on your behalf. Oh well, now they know, and perhaps if they get similar calls, they’ll look more closely.

hambone · February 22, 2018, 1:26am

Apple Pruning: Is it good to prune a crow’s foot to just one stem? I keep encountering the same situation: if I prune off all the verticals plus the underneath twigs plus 2 out of 3 at crow’s foot, there’s almost nothing left on the branch. Is this correct?

Hillbillyhort · February 22, 2018, 2:16am

Yes I think that’s the idea,
Assuming the so called crows foot has narrow angles I just leave one.
Hoping that lateral Spurs will develope along the branch next year.
Some varietys develope a lot of Spurs , on 2-3 yr old wood , others , not so much.
Pruning is as much a "art “as it is a " science” !
And multiple choice , for sure.
There is no “one right way” to prune.
There are some wrong ways.

Try to pay attention to what happens when you do this , or that , and how it affects the growth next year, Each year re evaluating where you cut last year and how it responded.
Each variety responds differently to the same type of pruning .

Maybe I the "next life " we will " about "have it figured out. .?

hambone · February 22, 2018, 2:25am

Thanks. Do you prune a crow’s foot to one stem just to reduce branch congestion? Or to cut out weak crotches? I’ve never understood the reason for pruning out crow’s feet. Mystifies me. I see photos on pruned trees say in Tom Burford’s book and I notice a lot of long, long skinny laterals with very few twigs on them. I keep wondering where will the leaves grow that are needed to support the fruit spurs? 40 leaves per apple? I’m very efficient at pruning off most leaf bearing twigs (verticals, unders, crow’s feet, inward growers). There’s some principle or goal I’m missing about branch pruning that preserves leaf surface but I’m not sure what it is. It should not be a mystery after all these years.

Hillbillyhort · February 22, 2018, 2:50am

A crows foot I guess by " definition " would have narrow angles.
I try to remove narrow angled branches where ever they occur .
If the angles are wide like a cross I would leave them in general .
This is really to complexe for the written word, even one on one with at tree to demonstrate with, it can be bewildering. ,!

One thing I try to do is balance on each side of scaffold branches.
To prevent twisting by fruit load. So a cross shape at the end and other laterals along branch accomplishes this to some degree

Hillbillyhort · February 22, 2018, 3:22pm

Hambone
“Long skinny laterals with few twigs on them”

Some people would recommend heading back these " naked " laterals to develop side branching ,
I have found that heading cuts usually results in a "few " strong side shoots.
While leaving them long and uncut often results in many short fruit Spurs developing in the year after, I think this is more desirable .
This is variety dependent .

hambone · February 22, 2018, 5:59pm

Thanks. Do you find that the long, skinny uncut laterals eventually put out enough leaves to feed the fruit on that branch even if not headed? This is exactly the info I need, thank you.

ZombieFruit · February 22, 2018, 6:02pm

Three questions:

I plan to prune my apple trees on Sunday and I marked my branches last night. My trees will be in their second leaf this year. I would like to define my lowest set of scaffolds, but I am finding that trees do not always cooperate with the ideals that I might have. For instance, based on the existing branches, I cannot get 4 scaffold branches with at least 4 inches of vertical distance between each scaffold branch. Do you forsee any problems with keeping 4 imperfect scaffolds this year (some temporary- to be removed/replaced in a year)? Or should I go with 2 or 3 ideally spaced/positioned scaffolds (and a lopsided tree) and hope for new branches to work with next year?
I may try notching the central leader to push some branches in more ideal locations. When should notching be done? Dormant prune, bud swell, etc.?
Many of the recent orchard systems like Solaxe and Tall Spindle appear to not head the central leader at all (at least until they are full size). It is my concern that if I do not head back my central leader then I will not get a sufficient number of laterals to give me the “perfect” scaffolds that I am looking for. Are my concerns warranted, or will my trees have no problems putting out more laterals from the central leader? Thanks!