Return to the Gardening in the UK Forum
| Post a Follow-Up
apple tree problems
| | |
Posted by frenchie_organic (My Page) on Wed, Jul 16, 08 at 2:29
| I have a bramley apple tree that we brought over from England 3 years ago, it has cropped every year, but instead of growing upwards its growing outwards and down, how do I prune it to stop the branches touching the ground ? I picked over 14 kilos of fruit off it yesterday to relieve it of some weight, so that the branches didnt break |
Follow-Up Postings:
RE: apple tree problems
| | |
It can depend to an extent on vigour of the tree which is often down to root stock. In general bramleys have quite alot of vigour putting on quite alot of upright growth. In your case I wonder if the tree has taken on this shape if allowed to carry alot of fruit while young. The heavy fruit pulling down the young growth which by picking time has often set into the shape you now have. Your actually likely to get a bigger crop with the growth hanging down as the sap instead of going into rampant growth wood will build up flowering growth instead. If your not happy with the trees shape and it is still young when dormant in winter cut back the weeping branches to an upward facing bud (considering they are mainly going to be facing down) hopefully in spring new growth will take on an upward route which you can then train to your required shape but once again remember to thin the fruit while young so as to not have to much weight pulling down on the branches.
Just my thoughts on the matter |
|
|
|
|
