Hi I'm Tricia an organic gardener, I grow organically for a healthy and safe food
supply,
for a clean and sustainable environment,
for an enjoyable and rewarding experience.
Pruning is a skill that every gardener needs. Today we're going to be going over
the basics of training as well as pruning a multi-grafted tree.
Some of the basic tools you'll need for pruning,
bypass hand pruners, I'm using the Comfort Gel by Corona,
loppers have a long, thirty-two inch professional loppers
a saw, a hand saw, this is the razor tooth saw and if you have big, older trees you
may need a pole pruner.
Dull tools can hurt your trees,
this is a handy little tool to have to sharpen your tools.
For more information on sharpening and cleaning,
check out our Tool Care video.
Disinfect your pruners in between each tree and if your cutting any diseased
branches, make sure and disinfect between each cut, just use rubbing alcohol or denatured
alcohol.
Today Ill be pruning this multi-grafted curl resistant peach and I'll show you which
tool to use for each situation.
Unlock the pruner and hold it in your hand to where it's comfortable
and you have a full control when it's open.
Insert the limb into the open pruner to the innermost point of the throat, this
is the point where the pruner provides maximum cutting power,
this is the pivot point.
Making sure that the branch is at the throat of the pruner will leverage the
cutting power of the pruner and reduce the force on your hand.
The further the limb pushes out to the tip of the blade the more force it's
gonna take to cut
and this can cause injury to you, the tree, or the tool.
These two handed pruners are great if you lack hand strength
or
if the branch your cutting is in a tight squeeze too tight for regular loppers.
If it doesn't fit or feel comfortable in your hand it's best to use a lopper,
this gives you increased leverage by using two hands.
The rule of thumb for choosing a pruning tool is
a one-inch diameter branch or smaller use pruners,
one inch to two inch branch use the loppers and two inches plus in
diameter
use the pruning saw.
Using the proper size pruner for your hand along with the proper size cutting
capacity will make the pruning cut easy.
Now let's talk about the types of cuts you'll use. There's two main types of cuts,
the thinning cut,
and the heading cut.
A heading cut shortens the branch by cutting it at a slight angle back to an
outward facing bud.
These types of cuts stimulate a lot of bushy growth and water sprouts.
These cuts are used mostly on young trees as well as on peaches and
nectarines.
For a thinning cut I'm gonna take out a branch
down to another branch that's at least of third of the size of the branch I'm
cutting. This type of cut does not stimulate as much growth
and is much better for controlling a tree size than heading cuts.
It's also called a thinning cut when you take a branch off right to the collar. See this little
raised part, this is the branch collar. This is where the tree will heal from.
It's important to thin a branch back to the collar but don't cut into the branch
collar or the cut won't heal right.
As you can see I've worked on balancing this tree.
The trick with multi-grafts is to make sure that one graft doesn't take over
the whole tree.
If you have to take a large branch and it requires you to use a saw
you want to also be mindful of the collar and not cut into it.
Always use a
thinning cut on large branches not a heading cut. To take out a large branch
with the pole saw
were going to use the three cut method,
make sure that there's nobody that can get injured when the branch falls down.
Starting about a foot from the branch collar saw a third of the way through the
branch from the bottom.
Switch sides and saw the branch completely through from the top, a few
inches beyond your first cut.
See this ridge of bark
make your final pruning cut with an equal and opposite slant.
Avoid cutting branches that are larger than four inches in diameter if at all possible.
Ideally these large pruning cuts should happen on branches that are one to two
inches in diameter.
Pruning cuts on branches larger than four inches in diameter can open trees up
to decay.
If you have to use a ladder to prune a large tree
make sure and use a three legged orchard ladder.
These are the safest ladders you can use for pruning trees.
If you're uncomfortable climbing ladders
or you don't have an orchard ladder I highly recommend that you hire a
certified
arborist to prune your trees.
I'm your friend and friends
don't let friends climb ladders alone
make sure that you prune when somebody's home.
Prune safely,
keep your trees healthy and grow organic for life!