This is a quick overview of pruning young peach trees.
The variety is Contender. The rootstock is Bailey. Bailey is a fairly vigorous stock producing a tree almost as vigorous and final size as own roots. My farms soil is sandy loam so this rootstock is a good fit.We like to get our peach pruning done prior to the timing for any Peach Leaf Curl sprays as this will reduce the amount of spraying.These pics were taken in early January 2021 of 7 year old trees.
It is hard to tell from these pics but the main object is to remove most of the vigorous new growth that occurred last year. This you can see is the very tall, upright shoots. This is all one year of growth and will be removed each year.Thats the general rule to follow but of course there is much more to it than just that. With each upright shoot you remove you have to also decide: Do you want to leave a portion of the shoot to form a new major scaffold (branch) for the future? Replacement scaffolds are a necessary part of the long term viability of the tree. Do you want to leave a portion of the shoot for this years fruit production? Not likely on the this age of tree with its very vigorous growing tree shoots.
Once you have removed all the major upright growth from the tree it will be much simpler to decide how to proceed from there. The outward facing branches, ones that have branchlets coming out towards the outside of the tree, are the ones you want to keep.
Basically you can top one of these branches down to the first or second outward facing branchlet. The more outward facing branchlets on a branch the better. By the way branchlet is not a word its just my descriptor.You can see that if you keep doing this, year after year, you will end up with a spreading and gradually rising tree. My experience shows me that the gradually rising part is offset by fruit load weight. As these spreading branches turn into main scaffolds getting larger and larger in diameter they also droop down from fruit load. This is why its important to have a succession of replacement branches coming along to replace the old ones.
I must say, at this point, that there are many, many ways to prune a peach tree. All of them may be just as correct as the next but what seperates them is the style fitting the need.
The pruning method I have described is a classic open vase method that you can modify to either always stay within "pedestrian height", no ladders, as we do or train by scaffold height to be any overall height you want.
This is a quick overview of pruning young peach trees.
The variety is Contender. The rootstock is Bailey. Bailey is a fairly vigorous stock producing a tree almost as vigorous and final size as own roots. My farms soil is sandy loam so this rootstock is a good fit.
We like to get our peach pruning done prior to the timing for any Peach Leaf Curl sprays as this will reduce the amount of spraying.
These pics were taken in early January 2021 of 7 year old trees.
It is hard to tell from these pics but the main object is to remove most of the vigorous new growth that occurred last year. This you can see is the very tall, upright shoots. This is all one year of growth and will be removed each year.
Thats the general rule to follow but of course there is much more to it than just that. With each upright shoot you remove you have to also decide:
Do you want to leave a portion of the shoot to form a new major scaffold (branch) for the future? Replacement scaffolds are a necessary part of the long term viability of the tree.
Do you want to leave a portion of the shoot for this years fruit production? Not likely on the this age of tree with its very vigorous growing tree shoots.
Once you have removed all the major upright growth from the tree it will be much simpler to decide how to proceed from there. The outward facing branches, ones that have branchlets coming out towards the outside of the tree, are the ones you want to keep.
Basically you can top one of these branches down to the first or second outward facing branchlet. The more outward facing branchlets on a branch the better. By the way branchlet is not a word its just my descriptor.
You can see that if you keep doing this, year after year, you will end up with a spreading and gradually rising tree. My experience shows me that the gradually rising part is offset by fruit load weight. As these spreading branches turn into main scaffolds getting larger and larger in diameter they also droop down from fruit load. This is why its important to have a succession of replacement branches coming along to replace the old ones.
I must say, at this point, that there are many, many ways to prune a peach tree. All of them may be just as correct as the next but what seperates them is the style fitting the need.
The pruning method I have described is a classic open vase method that you can modify to either always stay within "pedestrian height", no ladders, as we do or train by scaffold height to be any overall height you want.
My lovely wife taking a break while picking from a 24 year old Harbelle peach tree.
My lovely wife taking a break while picking from a 24 year old Harbelle peach tree.