In article , "Anonny Moose"
wrote:

Thin the fruit a lot. It should be about 8 inches between fruit on a
mature tree. On a young tree there should be even greater spacing. You
can do a little trimming now but the major pruning should occur during
the dormant season.

You are correct that the load of fruit will break the branches. That is
not a good thing.

Dick


I have several apple and Japanese pear trees that were planted 2 -3 years
ago. They are looking scraggly and I'm wondering if I should trim them in
some way. They have a few branches that are very long and now carrying so
much fruit they are drooping almost to the ground. I've thinned the fruit
in
hopes of saving the branches from breaking but I'm wondering if I should
just cut back the long branches to force side branching? At the moment, I
can't imagine they will ever look like normal trees!