For me, the damned water sprouts are the only downside to bending. Where I found bending to be most useful was with seedling stock that provides a ton of push (I’m thinking M111 is probably pretty similar). If you wait too long (like I did), the vigorous uprights are tall and thin. You pull them down and then the following year pop, pop pop pop the fruits appear. Great…right? Yeah, it is, but now the fruit load pulls the branch even more horizontal resulting in even more water sprouts. Pull them as horizontal as you dare if you want to remove the stakes more quickly. They will slowly start an attempt to get vertical again.
I used cedar wood shims easily driven into the ground with a notch (so easily made) with a utility knife to tie the string to. I used mason’s twine with a bit of rubber tape loosely laid around the branch. I used this because it’s what I had handy. I’ve seen coat hangers cut and bent into an “L” shape used on other sites. Anything that holds the branch down will work the same no doubt.
It’s a great tactic and technique, but be aware, water sprouts will form and they will grow like mad.
Chis in Georgia’s tree is a prime example. Thinning as applenut says and bending will put a ton of fruit on that SOB, but it will no doubt WS like crazy. It’s still the right thing to do. That’s gonna be a nice productive tree I think.
Oh…wanted to mention. Chris, you won’t have to bend them for very long. It can be a pia for mowing and whatnot, but it only takes about 2-3 weeks tops. They will maintain enough of their horizontal growth to get the desired effect next year. More fruit and the limb will thicken greatly.
In the old apple trees I manage, major scaffolds are usually below horizontal as the weight of fruit over the years tends to train them that way. It provides me with about 2 months of high paying work doing the summer pruning of these huge old trees- but lots of water sprouts also come from the trunk itself.
In Europe it is common to train trees on more dwarfing rootstocks to a weeping branch structure. Presumably the cost of mopping out water sprouts doesn’t exceed the rewards of early cropping, which also reduces vegetative growth in itself.
OMG…never have truer words been spoken. Just happened to me a few weeks ago, but in my case, it snapped off at the graft union. Worse still, it wasn’t a Geneva RS which is known for it, but rather a Malling dwarf. The part about the early fruiting and pulling down the limbs enhancing fruiting is also spot-on.
As I said, for me…dwarfs are history here except on fence espaliers.
Yay. I also vote for apples harvested from actual trees! Of course, I do have a vested interest in a plant that requires a great deal of skilled pruning. This single activity has been half my business for 25 years.
Well, I took applenut’s expert advice and gave the Goldrush tree a pretty good pruning. I realized that it was mainly water sprouts that was giving the tree the bush look. I have had good success promoting spurs during winter pruning by following applenut’s advice and cutting the side branches and water sprouts back to a couple of leaf buds but at least for my M-111 trees, looks like I will need to be doing this kind of pruning during the summer as well and hope it does not create a FB outbreak.
Even while knocking off some fruit during the pruning, after opening up the tree I see more apples than I did before so maybe I owe my M-111 tree an apology for dogging it in my original post.
Looks good Chris. It appears like you had previously bent some limbs. My not so experience with FB is that most of my damage has started around bloom time but I realize that is not the only time that it can be a problem. Goldrush is known for its FB resistance and my thought are that you will have no issues. CAR yes but not FB. Good luck, Bill
Looks great on a horizontal cordon. I’m surprised that you got second year production. Do you think it would work for a Belgium Fence? I’m wondering if the trunks and the branches may get too thick and ruin the whole idea of a Belgium Fence that close together. Also would there be enough room for the roots that close together? Another concern would be how long they would take to fruit at a 45 degree angle as opposed to 90 or more.
A Belgian fence is nothing more than a bunch of these planted in a line… So yes I think it would work. And don’t worry about the root proximity.
The trunks and scaffolds (branches) do grow and thicken as would a regular tree.
Take a look below to a post I made earlier this year. Note I said “second year in the ground” not that they were two years old…having been bought as bare root.
Keep in mind that it is you who controls the growth and spread. Just look at what human intervention accomplishes with bonsai trees.
I have grafted budwood of m27 onto m111 and made a nice shape tree that is precocious, better anchoring with strong winds. You can do the same thing with g-11.
MM111 is my new favorite stock, after years of dwarfs runting out I really appreciate the vigor. I’m seeing a couple years delay in fruiting compared to dwarf which is not so bad.
Yeah, once your orchard is producing, but if you are anticipating your first crop- not so much.
How soon varieties bear on any given rootstock also has a ton to do with soil and cultivar. You seem to experience close spacing as an accelerator to fruiting as well.
Most trees in my nursery are on 111 and usually by the time I install them they bear soon enough being already at least 4 years in my nursery, on average.
But some sites some varieties can take a very long time to come into bearing even with these older trees if the soil and variety inspires vigor. Goldrush, Zestar, Jonathon, Honeycrisp and other reasonably precocious types save me at such sites.
Also, at sites that inspire vigor, 111 means I will be doing a lot of pruning on all but spurry varieties like Goldrush.
thanx