Size of plum tree?

[cheops]

Hi all.
I bought and planted two plum trees in my garden early last year and they are growing well with no problems.
However my query is this. According to the catologue they should grow to about 2 metres. Can I pinch or snip off the end of new growth [particuliary at the top of the tree] in order to keep the tree to a smaller height, say to no more than one and 1/2 metres. I do not want the trees to ever get taller than this mainly for causing shade to the rest of my smalish garden. Will this affect the potential bearing of fruit or as i hope will keep the tree small in height and be a rather bushy ree instead which will bear lots of fruit? I appreciate all your advice.

[tootles]

You will need to prune it to keep it a nice shape and to get the best fruit from it anyway.
Early spring is a good time, you can take off the main trunk bit and also give the whole tree a goblet shape ie open and wide so as to give sun to all fruit and easy access for the picker. I think the tree will grow from the trunk below though as well so I'm not sure how much of the height you will be able to control.

[cheops]

Thank you for that tootles. You also say 'I'm not sure how much of the height you will be able to control. ' Surely now I know restricting the height will not affect potential cropping, I can control the height simply by continually cutting off any growth which gets above my desired height of one and a half metres?

[tootles]

True, you can take off the branches that get too high for you - but could the height stated not be the trunk height?? There you would have to take off alot of productive growth - the tree would probably put out new branches but it would not give so much fruit?
I'm no expert - I have only taken an interest in my fruit trees this year. Hopefully there is someone who knows their stuff here.

[cheops]

Well tootles - thx again - at the vey least you have given me food for thought. Hopefully others will give some input. I'm also wanting to restrict the height of a young Conference pear which might well be damaging to the tree as i have seen conference pear trees of 10 metres and more.

[tootles]

I have a very old pear which is in a terrible condition. I am desperate to get it fruiting again, I think it's main problem is in the pollination though. If you come up with any practical chopping advice - do stick it on here please.

[teakdesk]

Cheops - if you look at trees in a wood etc. you will see that young trees are made up of a thin trunk and somewhere at the top of that trunk there are the first branches coming out.

As the tree grows the trunk without branches gets thicker and longer (ie taller) so the height that the first branches start to come out is higher up.

As a tree grows the trunk gets even thicker and longer and the first branches get even higher. This continues until the tree reaches maturity.

The height of these first branches is determined by the root stock and is not really affected by any pruning you do to the branches.


So if the root stock of your tree is going to put the first branches 5 feet off the ground and you prune all the branches above 5 feet you will have no tree left - just a big stick in the ground.

If you see what I mean !!!!!!



You can train a tree at an angle if you want to keep the tree height down - there are many different ways to do this but a big stake put at 45 degrees can be used to tie the tree to and then prune the side branches to suit.

[FB.]

From my experience of fruit trees, I'd say that most can just about be maintained at a size which is half of their potential.
If the rootstock wants to grow to 2m, keeping it at 1.5m should be no problem - but it may require a bit more pruning.
Keeping it at 1m would be the very smallest that you might be able to achieve and the tree will be a somewhat unhappy, but should still fruit adequately.
If your soil is low in nutrients of low in water-retention, the final size can be considerably smaller. I'm in a low-rainfall area on a hot, dry, shallow, sandy soil and trees only every reach half or, at best, three-quarters of their potential in a better part of the country.

[teakdesk]

FB, in my previous post I didn't want to get too technical or detailed; just give a simple explanation as to why it is not as simple as just lopping the top off the tree.

As you say, tree height is affected by soil conditions (ie what the roots are in) and I know that you can prune or restict the roots to keep a tree more compact (à la Bonzai !!!!) but have no idea how to do it.

Have you any advice on root pruning or root restriction ?

[FB.]

teakdesk,

Yes, things can get very complicated very quickly, when trying to describe growing and pruning techniques.

Root pruning is literally driving a shovel into the ground to sever the surface roots and stress the tree, which then encourages fruiting.

To me, root restricting is either growing in a pot, or growing in some other confined area - such as fig pits - where a hole is dug, then the sides and bottom are lined with slabs or other root-unfriendly materials, to contain the roots within the hole.
I am experimenting with a few apple bushes (on semi-vigorous rootstock MM106), but growing them in "pits" that restrict root spread.

Back to what you were saying.....
If the tree has a 4ft trunk and 1ft "head" of branches, then it looks silly.
The ideal shape to please my eyes seems to be a trunk that is about one-thirds of the trees total height. In other words, a 6ft high tree would have a 2ft high trunk and a 4ft high head coming off that trunk.

[teakdesk]

FB, it was root restriction that I was thinking might work in Cheops situation.

After taking out an old Victoria plum three winters ago, I bought two plum and one gage on a dwarf root-stock (I forget which). I only really wanted one plum but the price on a second was so good I couldn't resist a bargain and the gage was a free offer!!

I digress. One plum went into its intended position in the middle of the lawn and the other plum and gage went into pots. After one season the "lawn" plum was noticably larger with the other two similar sized.

After that season the gage was planted out and I now have three trees of different size with the potted plum being very noticably the smallest. The potted plum obviously has less blossom/fruit potential.

I did wonder whether Cheops could dig a tree up, plant into a pot with holes all over it and then sink the pot back into the trees original place.

What do you think ?

I suspect that if it works to keep the tree smaller it will delay and maybe reduce the fruiting.

[FB.]

I did wonder whether Cheops could dig a tree up, plant into a pot with holes all over it and then sink the pot back into the trees original place.

What do you think ?

I suspect that if it works to keep the tree smaller it will delay and maybe reduce the fruiting.

The idea would probably work, with the benefit of reducing the spread of root suckers, but I'd still go for hard summer pruning. If that fails, digging the tree out will literally "root prune" it anyway.
I have yet to see a fruit/nut tree that did not respond to a very hard summer prune, but my experience of plums and pears is much less than apples or hazelnuts (which respond extremely well to summer pruning).
Plums and pears don't do as well on my soil and they tend to be more troublesome than apples or hazelnuts, and don't tend to store for very long, so I have less interest in them

I would think that simply by reducing the amount of feeding and watering and by increasing the amount of pruning (especially summer pruning), there will be no problem keeping a tree much smaller and the summer pruning in particular should increase fruitfulness as well as make the tree more compact.

For me, pruning (in mid-late July) all the new green shoots back to between 1-5 buds seems to work well. The harder the prune the better (2-3 buds is my most common pruning cut), subject to maintaining a nice tree shape. Pruning older wood has much greater risk of letting diseases get into the tree.
A few well-placed shoots can be left unpruned, if required to improve the branch structure for later years.

[cheops]

Gosh, it all seems so complicated, but i'm quite taken how you have all tried to advise and help. In my naivety I thought if you kept cutting the top of the tree keeping it to the desired height then the tree would have no option but to branch out at the lower levels. After all, you see trees lopped off quite drastically on roadsides to stop overhang for traffic and branches on the denuded trunks sprout from everywhere. I guess the real answer is that I should have initally bought a dwarf rootstock tree who's mature height was about one and half metres. Grr, hindsight is a wonderful thing. Thanks everyone - may everything you touch blossom. Cheops.

[FB.]

Cheops

Rather than cutting the tree back to the same height each year, I would:

1.
In mid-July, cut back half of the new green shoots to a length of about 2-4 inches. Leave unpruned any that you want to grow into new branches in later years.

2.
In late-February, thin out branches that you don't want to keep - either cut them out completely, or cut them back to 2-4 inches and then summer-prune those branches, to form fruiting spurs.
If you want a branch to divide into 2-4 new branches, cut it back by at least half it's length.

3.
It is important to stick to the correct pruning types and the times. If you prune too early or too late, you won't get the desired result. For example, given the nice weather recently, people are now gardening and want to prune their fruit trees because it's pleasant to work in the garden. But now is not the right time and any pruning they do will probably cause more harm than good.

Hopefully that will help your management of the tree.


Even if the tree has a 4ft trunk and 1ft "head", the tree will occasionally send out a branch part-way up the trunk, which you could allow to grow and therefore use to lower the height of the "head".

[Rob G]

There is mention in several of the posts to this forum of the pruning of plums.

I have always been told, and that seems to be backed up by the older gardening book I have, that plums should only be pruned in summer and typically when you pick the fruit. The reason given is that the prevents infection by the silver leaf fungus.

A number of the comments here on plum pruning indicate winter/spring pruning - are these comments correct and the old book I have incorrect ?

Rob