A Lidl fruit tree advice

[bearded bloke]

Marb, I'm fairly rubbish at fruit trees but, given your existing problems with the lack of light in your growing area could you espallier your trees to the brick wall, that would keep the canopy to a minimum.

[Jay-ell]

I'd have thought a bigger problem would be them having enough room below ground. Even supposing that your trees all manage to find a way to stretch their roots contentedly in just over 3 square feet each, that many roots in such a small space would presumably severely deplete the nutrients in the soil. I assume you are planning on feeding heavily?

Yep, will be doing regular feeds but part of it is that the root competition should reduce vigour.

The place where they are planted used to be a giant manure pile so the ground is 50 percent manure plus loads of wood ash.

There's a high silica content but this is mainly in the firm of shards of glass the previous tenants buried to dispose of.

It's all an experiment so I'll see if it works after all if you don't try you'll never know.

[Alison]

It seems that Conventional Wisdom says that the plums and cherries can't be grown as cordons but as neither of these words is often associated with me I'll be growing them as a cordon anyway and adapt the pruning to them.

I believe the mains reasons that stone fruits aren't recommended for cordons is twofold. Firstly they are similar in fruiting to tip bearing apples therefore if pruned as cordons you will loose a lot of the fruiting buds. Secondly and probably more importantly is that the pruning regime required for cordons necessitates winter and summer pruning and pruning stone fruits in the winter is a bad idea.

[Jay-ell]

Everything I read says that in pruning stone fruit you end up pruning off the fruiting wood. That is IF you prune them like apples and pears.

I'm going to try growing double groups of spurs so one gets pruned back to one leaf after harvesting the fruit whilst the other puts on new growth for next year. That way they get pruned every other year and there is always older wood to fruit on.

This has been buzzing about in my brain for a while so I thought that it's better to try and fail than never try at all.

[lookbettertomorow]

I believe the mains reasons that stone fruits aren't recommended for cordons is twofold. Firstly they are similar in fruiting to tip bearing apples therefore if pruned as cordons you will loose a lot of the fruiting buds. Secondly and probably more importantly is that the pruning regime required for cordons necessitates winter and summer pruning and pruning stone fruits in the winter is a bad idea.

Sorry Alison, have to disagree. See exhibit 1-4
My 5' step over Plum, it's against a north facing 6' fence. 5' so it gets the sunshine, trick.
It's neither winter pruned or tip bearing.
Just to be clear, a Cordon in my interpretation is a single stem, branch or trunk with no branches off it, just little stubs or fruiting spurs.

The secret? there isn't one, once the form is created simply summer prune all new growth back to 3 or 4 leaves, cut all the new growth to a few inches

[Bigmallly]

My 5' step over Plum, it's against a north facing 6' fence. 5' so it gets the sunshine, trick.

5 foot & Step over are not terms I would put together. You'd need bladdy long legs...................

[WendyC]

Limbo under possibly.

[veggiechicken]

At 5' its a duck under tree.

[lookbettertomorow]

...was trying to be funny

[veggiechicken]

..........and so were we

[PyreneesPlot]

And you all were
My dad insisted on growing step overs but he was so clumsy they were more often trip-overs. And yes I proudly carry those genes.
Good luck with the trees, Marb I'd go for pots that could be moved, too.

[Marb67]

2 years on and it has not produced a single fruit BUT it is growing very fast, very healthy (despite a lot of holes in leaves where something has been eating it)the trunk already about 4 inches in diameter. I thought it would be a small tree but it looks to be a full size.

We have a lot of sparrows in the garden now and wondering if they have nibbled all the flowers out (although I don't remember seeing any)

I just need to know if and when I can prune it to keep on top of it. Here is a pic.

Thanks.

[Jay-ell]

How have you pruned it?

[veggiechicken]

Looking good, Marb.
Is that the plum or the pear as they have different pruning regimes. Don't ask me what they are though - you need an expert for that.

[4Shoes]

Looks like it's not been pruned.

Stoned fruit, June / July time
Apple / Pear - Winter.

Aim for a Goblet shape. Don't remove more than 25% material.

Start by removing bad wood, then crossed branches, then reduce height. General rule is 1/3rd new growth, but if never pruned, perhaps best to reduce height and then shape next year.