Pruning Apple trees?

[JimS]

Having recently moved into a new place, I have inherited a few Apple trees.

But I have no idea where to start in terms of pruning them.

I notice they have all these 'whippy' shoots on them.

Do they need to be cut back or removed altogether?

Any advice would be appreciated.

I have attached a couple of pics to show what I mean.

Thanks
Jim

[rustylady]

Our resident fruit expert FB will be along in a while I expect. In the meantime welcome to the vine. Whereabouts are you, as your location can affect any advice given.

If you add your location (nearest town) to your profile it will show up on your posts.

[JimS]

Hi rustylady and thank you for the welcome.

I shall change my profile as you suggest.

Jim

[FB.]

Most of the shoots going straight up would be best if cut out completely - just keep a few of them where you want the tree to grow new branches in future.
Remove any dead or diseased bits.

Then post some pictures at the start of July to see how it responded to the winter pruning and whether it would benefit from some summer pruning.

Trees don't normally need pruning twice per year, but if they need to be brought back under control it can require two or three seasons to tidy them up if you want to avoid over-invigorating, under-invigorating, spoiling their shape or affecting their cropping.

Looking at the tree, it looks like someone "tidied it up" in the last year or two and all the fruit spurs were pruned off, hence the tree producing lots of vigorous upright shoots. It may be a couple of years of careful pruning before normal cropping is restored.

[JimS]

Thanks FB,

I think you are right, in that the previous owner did do some pruning. During the summer they looked like large, shaped bushes, with a few apples on. No light was getting through to the inner fruit it seems.

I appreciate your advice and let's see how they look in 6 months time

Regards

Jim

[FB.]

let's see how they look in 6 months time

It's not so much that the tree needs looking at every six months, but the fact that mid July is a good time for pruning to restrict the amount of new growth (especially for removing over-vigorous upright shoots) and to encourage more cropping the following year.

However, summer pruning must not be used for trees which are barely growing, and summer pruning must not cut into older wood; only the current-season's shoots should be pruned in mid-July and they are best shortened to between one and three buds (about one to three inches of each new shoot's growth retained, on which fruit will probably be borne the following year).

[JimS]

That makes sense FB.

I shall definitely bear all your points in mind and, hopefully, I will get a decent crop this year. It would be nice to have enough to make one bottle of cider at least

[FB.]

That makes sense FB.

I shall definitely bear all your points in mind and, hopefully, I will get a decent crop this year. It would be nice to have enough to make one bottle of cider at least

Judging by the look of the tree and the way it was pruned, I fear that the crop this year won't be much.

But if you prune the tree in the right way at the right time you might get a useful crop in 2015 and back to full cropping in 2016.

The problem with most fruit trees is that people don't do any pruning for ten years, then "tidy up" the tree in an unknowledgable way, then wonder why it grows like mad and wont fruit. So they continue to poorly prune the tree and the tree responds by growing back strongly and not fruiting. Eventually the tree becomes ugly and still won't fruit so they cut it down.

The general rule is if you want fruit: don't prune the tree, or only prune lightly. But pruning lightly doesn't mean a shearing (because it can remove all the fruit buds). Light pruning means secateurs and selecting shoots to remove or cut back. As few cuts as possible make a good pruning technique.
Unfortunately, from what I can make out in your pictures, in the case of your tree, in recent years, someone has cut off a great deal of the outer canopy in a similar way to shearing, so most of the fruit spurs appear to have been lost (fruit spurs tend to mostly be nearer the outer canopy).

Most apple trees are "spur bearers" which is to say that they fruit along the side of shoots which are a few years old - and the shoot will be more fruitful if it is growing closer to horizontal than vertical.
So once someone has removed a lot of the older shoots, it takes a few years for the new shoots to age enough to start fruiting along their sides.
Vertical shoots tend to just keep growing and not fruiting. Hence they are best got rid of, apart from any that you might want to keep for shaping purposes in the future.

[FB.]

The general rule is if you want fruit: don't prune the tree, or only prune lightly.

With that in mind, and bearing in mind the very poor way in which someone pruned the tree in recent years (the pictures are example of the worst kind of pruning from someone who hasn't got a clue!), if the size and shape of the tree doesn't bother you, you could just leave the tree alone - no pruning, no feeding, no watering and it will start fruiting again in a few years time.
But ironically, if someone pruned it (badly) in hopes of keeping it smaller, they will be disappointed because removing the fruit spurs often results in the tree stopping fruiting and becoming much larger than it originally was.

[JimS]

Aah, so it sounds as though I have my work cut out for me then...

The trees did fruit this last season, but quite poorly (in my mind) to the size of them. Some almost not at all, just a handful of apples.

Would that have been down to the previous pruning?

There are some videos on the interweb that I have watched showing folks tackling neglected or badly pruned trees, but none of them look remotely like the ones here, so are not much help.

Should I leave the vertical spurs that are on the lower branches? Particularly at the tips. I presume they will grow on to be fruit-bearing branches in the future...

I have tried to follow the rule of 'a 1/3rd at any one time' and have taken off those branches that are growing into the middle of the trees and any damaged or diseased ones. Mainly in the hope of letting a bit more light and air into the middle of the trees.

As I say, last year they looked like the result of an exercise in Topiary.. From my (little bit of) reading, I have come to the conclusion that the trees need to be a bit more open and branches given room to fruit. Would I be right in that?

[happyhermit]

JimS

I have just purchased the hardback RHS Pruning & Training book by Brickell & Joyce 2011 (ISBN 978-1-4053-6312-9). It is very good with lots of diagrams. It has a section on renovating neglected fruit trees and overpruned fruit trees over a period of 2-3 years, again accompanied by diagrams. Might be just the thing.

[JimS]

Thanks HappyHermit,

I shall take a look, I could do with a good book on pruning.

Cheers

Jim