shazzbat wrote:

If I can tag on a question of my own: My books say that gooseberries
don't need pruning, but in recent years I've had a dramatic downturn
in quantity of fruit, with or without caterpillars, and the bushes are
straggling a bit. Does the panel thing that pruning would improve
yield, or at least not reduce it any more?

From what I've read, they fruit better on younger wood, so you could try
cutting out some of the old gnarly branches.

Harvest and prune in one fell swoop. Cut off the branches with fruit and
take them to the table to pick the fruit off. Both jobs done. This works
with blackcurrants etc too.

I'd not recommend this for gooseberries as a wholesale procedure. Sure do
a few branches to thin, but gooseberry fruits well for several years on
the same wood. I mostly prune out new growth, leaving maybe one new branch
per year, and remove some of the oldest wood. If your goosberry is
vigorous, you'll need to prune out or reduce side shoots etc to encourage
good air circulation (to keep down mildew and other diseases).

I've a 22 year gooseberry that gives me more than 25lbs fruit every year -
they really can be extraordinarily productive.