TREE SPACING AND APPLE ORCHARD MODIFICATION 



Williajn J. Lord 

 Department of Plant and Soil Sciences 



During the last 2 or 3 years, growers have been literally bombarded 

 with talks at meetings and with articles in publications concerning tree 

 walls, mold-and-hold pruning and size-controlled rootstocks. Along with 

 these innovations has been a renewed interest in the age-old practice 

 of scoring. The advocates of these practices are attempting to develop 

 orchards with early and heavy production per acre from trees that can 

 be harvested during a shorter period of time with the minimum of harvest 

 laborers. Therefore, it is of interest to reflect on what we were doing 

 in Massachusetts orchards before this bombardment, what is happening now, 

 and what may happen in our orchards in the future. 



What We Were Doing 



During the 1950' s, growers became concerned about the tree height 

 in many of their older plantings with tree spacing of M-O' x M-0' . Many 

 of these tall trees were in blocks originally planted 20' x 20', but 

 growers had failed to restrict tree size and thereby lower limbs were 

 "shaded out" and the trees grew tall from crowding. 



The "Allen" way of lowering trees was introduced to Massachusetts 

 in 1952, but growers finally settled for a more gradual lowering of 

 trees to 18 feet or less. Since 1960, we have advocated restricting 

 tree size and shaping trees like Christmas trees branches in the up- 

 per half of the trees are cut back to insure the maintenance of vigor- 

 ous and fruitful lower limbs. 



From 1960 through 1965, M-5% of the trees planted were on size-con- 

 trolling rootstocks, with the majority on E.M. VII. These trees were 

 spaced 20' x 30', giving 72 trees per acre. In a few orchards, however, 

 growers experimented with trees on E.M. IX, with trees on E.M. VII spaced 

 20' x 15' and with plantings having off -set rows. 



What is Happening Now 



As a result of the bombardment with proposed orchard innovations, 

 many growers are critically analyzing their orchards and their cultural 

 practices. They know that productive, mature Mcintosh trees planted 

 M-0' x M-0' can produce yields of 1000 bushels or more per acre annually. 

 But , it is many years before these trees at these planting distances at- 

 tain sufficient bearing surface to produce these profitable crops I 

 Therefore, growers reason that the answer to the problem of slow pro- 

 duction increases is to plant a large number of trees per acre to obtain 

 a large bearing surface early in the life of the orchard. Questions 

 remain as to what dwarfing stock is most suitable and what tree spacing 

 and pruning system to use. 



