GardenBanter.co.uk - View Single Post

Martin Brown · 02-09-2011, 12:09 PM posted to uk.rec.gardening

On 02/09/2011 09:08, wrote:
In ,
Martin wrote:

[ Aberrant apple ]

I'd be inclined to do it a third of the thinnest back hard, open up the
centre, one third back to half length or 3/4s if nice ones and strongest
branches left as is. Then next year you have to bite the bullet and chop
back the by then very long strong stems by an appropriate amount but
with any luck the moderate ones will be a good size again and you can
pick which new growth to leave on.

If you do short back and sides all at once the tree is inclined to
respond by lots of soft sappy growth mostly going straight upwards. You
are also unlikely to get fruit at all if you massacre it.

That is very much what I want to encourage! The problem is that
it has (despite repeated attempts to prune back) developed a single
strong branch out to one side. Inter alia, it could easily break
when in fruit unless I thin very hard indeed. I need to get it
to grow in a more upright way.

You could always take the Japanese approach and install a stout support
with a rubber tyre cushion to take some of the weight underneath the
errant branch during summer fruiting.

Oh, and the strong branch is to the NORTH, so it's not a sunlight
effect!

I'm not so sure. Now you say this I have a large long established
Bramley apple tree that had been allowed to go its own way by the
previous owner and its main stem chose North East and horizontal about 3
feet off the ground. The tree is still a bit unbalanced even now.

I rebalanced it gradually by consistently cutting back both sides, but
taking all of the weak growth off the side I wanted to grow stronger.
This seemed to work and eventually a balancing branch grew strong enough
that the tree is now approximately in balance. Lopping the main stem
back just encouraged a lot more strong growth from the cut end.

Regards,
Martin Brown