Page 12 



BETTER FRUIT 



February 



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In the winter pruning which you 

 would give young trees which have not 

 as yet much spur development, the 

 growth which occurs any one year 

 varies more with the growth the trees 

 made the previous year than on the 

 amount of pruning. The amount of 

 pruning does not control the amount 

 of growth with such trees. The amount 

 of pruning only determines the nature 

 of the growth, as heavy pruning pro- 

 duces strong sprouts and light pruning 



produces weaker sprouts, but more of 

 them, so that the sum total is not 

 changed. However, with mature trees 

 that have much bearing area in the 

 form of spurs, a different result might 

 be obtained. 



In pruning trees in the winter the 

 pruning naturally takes the form of 

 either a heading back or a thinning 

 out, or possibly a combination of the 

 two. If one desires simply some 

 strong sprouts, then heavy heading 

 back will produce that result; but if 

 one really desires more fruit develop- 



ment of spur and bud, then a moderate 

 heading back would be much superior, 

 since you would cut off a much smaller 

 number of buds and spurs and would 

 not discourage the formation of a 

 large number of new ones which might 

 be true in the heavy heading back. In 

 the same way, heavy thinning out is 

 only a question of mathematics, it re- 

 moves a much larger number of bear- 

 ing organs, such as buds and spurs, 

 than would light thinning, and a com- 

 bination of light heading and thinning 

 will probably generally produce the 

 best results. However, I believe that 

 many of our orchardists tend to head 

 back too severely in the pruning of 

 their trees. 



If we combine summer and winter 

 pruning we find they are really sup- 

 plementary of each other. For ex- 

 ample, if the June pruning consists 

 largely of heading back, the winter 

 pruning consists of thinning out and 

 vice versa. Let us consider a few 

 specific instances. We will take first 

 young trees from six to eight years 

 of age which naturally should be com- 

 ing into heavy bearing. One must 

 avoid over stimulating such trees by 

 heavy pruning. The chances are these 

 frees could be handled the best by a 

 possible heading back in June, fol- 

 lowed by a moderate thinning out in 

 winter — or should they be in that con- 

 dition that a thinning out is desirable 

 in June, then possibly a little more 

 thinning out or moderate heading back 

 in winter would be desirable. In some 

 cases these young trees get in such 

 condition the latter part of July that 

 a little thinning out, or even heading 

 back, is very desirable, allowing more 

 sunlight and air to reach the buds and 

 spurs which would probably encourage 

 them to become stronger, and probably 

 stimulating less secondary growth than 

 may be true with winter pruning. 



WTien trees get to be eight or ten 

 y^ars of age and have never borne 

 good crops, they should be checked as 

 far as tillage, plant foods and irriga- 

 tion are concerned, and the pruning 

 had better consist of a very light thin- 

 ning out until the trees reach heavy 

 bearing. One had perhaps better sacri- 

 fice a little as regards size and color in 

 the fruit, and bring the trees into bear- 

 ing, rather than to attempt a type of 

 pruning which might delay bearing 

 entirely for a number of years. 



After the trees once reach heavy 

 bearing they will stand much more 

 pruning. Let us consider the great 

 class of trees which most of us are 

 beginning to handle in the Pacific 

 Northwest now — trees which have 

 reached maturity and are in full bear- 

 ing. With these trees winter pruning 

 becomes to a large extent a thinning 

 process. That is, it aids in reducing 

 the number of specimens a tree might 

 proihice so as to encourage desirable 

 commercial size of fruit. We should 

 study these trees so as to keep a bal- 

 ance between the main branches, and 

 we nmst constantly seek to avoid weak 

 forks which will lead to fatal break- 

 age. We must grasp firmly one prin- 

 ciple of pruning in handling these trees, 

 namely, that the greatest response in 



