Restoring Old Apple Trees Video One

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Restoring Old Apple Trees Video Two

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Restoring Old Apple Trees Video Three

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Restoring Old Apple Trees Video Four

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Restoring Old Apple Trees Video Five

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This latest one is all about summer pruning.

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Summer pruning is a discretionary activity for orchard keepers, so you have to decide if it’s needed or not. Where a tree puts on a lot of new growth, then it’s worth thinning it out a bit but this will vary from season to season and from tree to tree. The best time is July or August, before the apples ripen to reduce apple scab  damage and increase the light levels.

Only the smaller manageable trees can be pruned in this way, not the giants.

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This tree is just beginning a bud burst, with the optimal number of buds filling the available space for fruiting.

Planting a very small tree, a one year maiden. Large rootball.  Plant bare rooted trees in the winter from a local nursery.

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Using the saw to remove low branches. Clearing away any rubbish, vines, young trees getting in the way. Take the big branches out first before using the secateurs. Remove crossed branches, anything that’s tangled up. leaving some new , healthy looking upright facing branches. Walk around the tree and look at it from different angles. Don’t take out more than a third of the wood, and don’t cut a bit off everything all round – pudding basin haircut.

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What to do with a neglected old fruit tree? Do you want maximum fruit or a big tree to sit underneath?

Here’s one to restore. Is the tree vigourous and in the right place.

Pruning a neglected apple tree is not difficult. A few simple principles and a sharp saw will see it all right. the main thing is to use the saw to remove whole branch systems that are diseased, too low, too crowded or crossing, and mostly leave the rest of the tree alone-at least for the first year.

There is a very good section in the RHS book ‘The Fruit Garden Displayed’ on pruning neglected trees, but sadly it’s out of print.

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Top working  or grafting over an apple tree which is sound, but not the right variety for example. This example is a Crimson King that has been grafted over to other varieties. A pencil of the chosen variety is cut in February and kept cool until around April when the tree is getting going. Saddle grafts and cleft graft techniques. Probably best not to let the graft fruit the first year, let the joint strengthen first. Will fruit heavily in only three years from being top grafted over.

Stephen Hayes of Fruitwise Heritage Apples prunes a mature Egremont Russet which made a lot of whippy new growth last year. This tutorial concentrates on using the secateurs to manage excessive whippy extension growth from the previous year, with an emphasis on balance and fruit bud management.

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Wear gloves when using the sharp saw. Upward facing branch. Up against the collar. be careful when working in the middle of a tree. Removing branches that are growing in to the centre. Creating space by removing one out of each pair of crossing branches.

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Pruning the bramley, famous cooking apple. Red flush, good quality cooking apple, ripens to yellow sweetness if kept long enough. Challenging tree. Space between the trees. Planted 10 years ago. The bramley is a big tree. In an ordinary garden you may want to put it on a small rootstock.

Each year we want the tree to do three thing. Produce new growth, formation of new buds , and fruit on old buds. Bramley is a tip bearing tree so don’t go round snipping off all the tips that’s the wrong way to prune it. Take out downward growing branches. Or any too high. We don’t go up trees with ladders any more.