Let's go ahead and begin.
I'm Jody Gale, County agent with Utah
State University Extension Service.
Pleased to be here and very pleased
to have Judy Brown and her husband
Lou hosting the demonstration this morning
We're going to be talking about how to
prune the home orchard.
I just referred to this publication
as we go through the discussion, I'll
refer to a few pages in here.
Really a good publication, we have this
posted on our state website.
Go to Extension.usu.edu that
comes to the main university extension
website in Logan.
There'll be a tab there for publications
you go to publications and there will be
a whole list of all kinds of topics.
So there'll be livestock, there'll be
home canning, there'll be family finance,
a whole host of information, but one
of those topics will be horticulture.
You go to horticulture and it will lead
you to this publication.
As well as a number of other ones.
Information about garden vegetables,
fertilizers, lawn care, etc.
So there's a lot of information published
there.
Before we begin, the first few things I'd
like to do is talk about pruning equipment
before we get right into the techniques
of pruning.
Probably my favorite and most used tool,
is a good pair of loppers.
They come in all kinds of shapes and sizes
some of them have gears, where you get
a little more pressure for cutting
purposes, where you cut much larger trees.
Those are okay. One feature that I do look
for if you do very much pruning you
very quickly feel up right there and
there in your elbows. So this has a little
rubber bumper in it, so as you cut and
your loppers come crashing together,
this is like a shock absorber and it tends
to take some of the fatigue out of
doing quite a bit of pruning.
Of course you can see that little shock
absorber going in and out.
So if you need to buy a pair, look for
something that's got some sort of rubber
bumper.
[Lady] Does the one I bought have that one?
[Jody] I'm not sure, we'll take a look at
it and see.
But that's one of the techniques
They come in metal handles or
wooden handles, I like wooden handles if
you can get some that are good.
There's a lot that don't have very good
wooden handles but wooden handles
are a little bit more flexible too.
You can handle anything from real small
stuff, these small hand pruners, are
better for the little things.
These work well for pruning up to maybe
maybe as much as an inch in diameter.
That's kind of the two types of jaws are
these bypass, I like the bypass better as
long as you keep them sharp.
The anvil type tend to be straight blade
with a flat pan on it. It's idea is it's
kind of like a knife blade coming down
and cutting against the metal pan.
Where this is like a scissor affect, so
these tend to get a little better cut and
in my opinion are a little easier to
keep sharp. A good pair of loppers, a good
pair of little hand sheers for the little
stuff.
Here's one with a big handle on it.
There's all kinds of pruning poles, if
you're trees are very big you'll want to
have something like this where you can
reach up a little higher.
Some of the pruning poles will have
a pruning saw on them so you can reach
up and you can do this and saw the bigger
limbs.
I don't do a lot of that, I'll try to get
some of that on a ladder.
But if you do a good job at pruning every
year a little bit on a regular basis
that'll reduce that type of pruning.
Again, this is a bypass mechanism, two
work together.
I really like this particular type, it's
got the pull cord mechanism is inside
the handle, so to make a cut you just
pull the handle down this way.
You don't have a rope, or a ribbon that
tends to be in the way because it's inside
the handle.
If you're really reaching out you can grab
the end right here and then pull again,
but it's fairly light where you can almost
handle it with one hand.
You can still reach up quite a ways.
These are available at a lot of lawn
and garden stores. All of these types
of tools are available in the lawn and
garden areas.
Lastly, let's talk about saws.
Carpenter saw is very different than
a pruning saw and this is the
reason for it.
Carpenter saw you're usually half over it.
Let's pretend this is a carpenter saw,
which it isn't, but you're cutting down
this direction, you're using the weight
of your body to push down.
When you're pruning you're usually up
here like this. So carpenter saws are
designed to cut when you push, pruning
saws are designed to cut when you pull.
So that way you take advantage of gravity
and the weight of your body. When you're
pulling down it tends to cut.
They will cut a little bit both ways, but
the teeth are designed in such a way
that they cut when you pull.
Now this is a pruning saw, Judy, it has
these long narrow teeth on it.
[Judy] I didn't know it was.
[Jody] It is a pruning saw, this is a
straight one. It has a straight blade
on it. This is a little folding one, it's
curved. You can see the long narrow teeth
on it that're really quite coarse and that
makes it possible to cut pretty quick.
I really like the round blade type.
[Judy] Is this a pruning saw?
[Jody] No, that's just a typical bow saw.
Kind of introduce that in just a moment.
If you look at those two, this is a
straight blade.
This is a curved blade, I really like
the curved effect because as you're
pulling down it tends to follow the cut
a little easier.
Where you can reach around the side
of a limb.
They come in folding saws, they come in
curved saws that are like this, or
straight saws that are like this.
They all work pretty good.
You can spend a lot of money on
pruning equipment if you want, it's
really not necessary but it is good
to look for something that's got good
handles and good metal in it.
Judy asked about the bow saw.
This is my Christmas tree cutting saw.
When I go cutting Christmas trees, that's
the one that I use. It's very very coarse.
These work okay for pruning purposes for
bigger limbs.
They aren't considered a pruning type
tooth on it, but they do work pretty good
for the big stuff.
Occasionally, you got some big stuff to
take out. I took an old piece of heater
hose put a long slit on it, this tends to
be pretty prickly especially if it's under
the seat of the pick up.
So just split a piece of old heater hose
or garden hose and make a little cover
for the blade and that protects them.
Let's have you open your books.
Go up to the very first page, just inside
there's a diagram there.
That's kind of a pretend tree.
The information that's in there,
we'll be talking about in just a minute
as we get to talk about tree structure.
There's been a lot of debate, even now,
some professional pruners will prune a
structure one way, other professional
pruners will prune another.
There's differences, I want to try to
point those out today.
Personally based on my pruning experience
my own experience, in my own orchard
I really prefer a tree that's got a center
leader.
This diagram is a tree of a center
leader, where you've got essentially a
root system, you got a trunk that comes up
with limbs going out in various directions
We'll get a little better look at that on
some of Judy's trees here in just a minute.
But trees want to grow up. They don't
want to grow out.
To keep your trees in good form, for
picking purposes, for strengthening limbs,
it's better to have the limbs going out
than going up.
A number of years ago many of the
commercial orchards would develop an open
center type pruning technique. If you look
in here under the peach section, there's
a peach tree that shows a trunk coming
up and then limbs going out in many
directions with no leader in the middle.
They create a lot of pruning work on
that type of open center.
Cause trees want to grow up, they don't
want to grow out. So your pruning work
ends up being about twice.
Both on peaches and apples going with a
center leader on the structure of the
tree works out a lot better.
So with that let's go over and we'll get
serious about working on a couple of Judy
and Lou's trees.
[Judy] Should we pause?
[Jody] So you come up here, you gotta
a scaffolding going that way, scaffolding
this way, one going that way, one with a
separation here going that way.
So there's one, two, three, four going all
directions, that's what you look for.
Then you have a center leader, this one
it's a little crooked but it's coming up
in the middle. Coming and putting this
brace on it, and they're in the process of
pulling this over. It's still young enough
and flexible enough they can straighten
this a little bit. You want to have
another roughly 3-4 limbs about this
height, somewhere around 5-6 feet off the
ground. Then you allow your center leader
to continue to go up and up about 8
feet high, almost as high as you can reach
you cut the central leader out.
You want to have maybe three limbs going
different directions.
[Judy] So that's what it says in here,
topping.
[Jody] Topping, that's correct.
So that's tree structure, now the open
center would be the same tree only with
this center leader removed entirely.
And that's the type that I would
discourage you from developing as
sometimes trees that have already been
developed in that manner, you just
deal with what you have.
The other thing to, at this point, I'd
like to point out is the angle of
the limbs.
You want to look for an angle that is not
horizontal like this, or an angle that
is quite vertical like that.
This angle is fair, it's just a little bit
steep. It would be better if the angle
were approximately like that on a
slight upward arc from the tree.
The purpose for that is that if you get
a limb that is very vertical, it develops
right down here at the bottom if you want
to scoot in here, I'll show you what a
bark inclusion looks like.
Bark inclusion are where two limbs are
very close together as they get bigger the
bark surfaces come together.
And it doesn't ever heal or knit. So this
area right here, this little wrinkled
surface is a bark inclusion.
And there's probably attached wood down
about this far. For the first maybe inch
and a half of this in here, there won't
be a lot of wood that's bound together.
It tends to make limbs that are really
quite weak.
All of the techniques that we talk about
today this is the one that's a take home
message. This is the one that's most
important. On how to decide where to cut.
If you ever want an exercise in making
decisions, pruning is one of those for
making decisions and if you kind of know
the basic structure of the tree and know
some of the basic criteria and rules
then that'll help you as you make those
decisions. But when it comes down
to making that cut, deciding what to cut
off and what to leave, you always prune to
a lateral branch.
Or always prune the lateral branch.
What that basically means is that,
on this limb right here we got two limbs
going out. You want to develop the limbs
that are kind of on the lower area, you
don't just arbitrarily come in and cut
here or cut here or cut there.
You select a limb that's going to continue
to grow.
This is actually a good lateral branch
right here. This is one that's directly
above it, so you'll take that one off.
And then take this one off.
This is the lateral branch, but these
are too close together so you'll take
that one off.
I'm selecting the bottom ones to get that
limb going out on that angle that I was
just speaking of.
Out of the end, select the lateral bud.
Now, if I were to make a cut right here,
there's a bud on the top of the branch,
it'll grow straight up.
You want to select a bud that's going to
go out.
So look for a bud such as this one here,
where it's on the underneath side of
the limb and it'll keep that limb going.
[Lady] And how far out do you want the
tree going?
[Jody] You can control that by making a
heading cut. Which is the one that I just
barely made.
Last year, we had about a quarter of new
growth on it and I shortened that about
six inches. And if every year you're
taking you're new growth and shortening
it by six inches, that will control how
wide your tree output is.
So that's the one real take home message
on pruning. It doesn't matter if you're
cutting a limb off that's that big around
or if you're cutting just a little twig
off like this one I just demonstrated.
You look for a lateral branch or a lateral
bud and you get to decide, as a pruner,
you get to decide the direction that trees
going to grow.
First we just barely talked about limbs,
let me talk about my prop.
This is a spreader, you can get them in
all kinds of shapes and materials.
They can come in plastic with these on
the end.
[Lady] On the internet it said when the
trees were little you can actually use
a clothes pin.
[Jody] Use a clothes pin, you can
actually put a stake in the ground and put
a string up and tie the limb down.
The idea is that if you've got a limb
that's not quite where you want it.
You want to spread it out a little bit,
you can make a spreader like this, it's
just a scrape piece of wood I'll put a
eight penny nail in the end. You want to
pound them in pretty good.
Take a pair of dikes and cut them off
so that they are pretty good and sharp
on the end.
You take one end, this one is a good
example of a limb to try to spread, even
though I just mentioned that it's kind
of steep.
But if I wanted to try to force it down,
one of the ways to do that is just take
and jam that sharp nail up in the bark and
then you just push this limb down and
wedge it in place and then let it
come back.
If you put too much pressure you can split
these bark inclusions open, so you have
to kind of work at it a little bit. Not
being too big of a hurt, because if you
just push a lot of pressure very quickly,
you can actually split the bark inclusions
open.
This is a limb that's growing quite
vertically.
Any limb on the top side going up this way
kind of needs to be taken off.
So this is one I'd remove entirely.
This one is going on a little bit of
an angle, so I'll spare that one.
These are on angles, remember the idea is
to get the tree to grow that way.
This part is wanting to grow up, so
I'm going to make a few little drastic
cuts if that's okay with you Judy.
[Judy] Oh yeah, you go right ahead.
[Jody] Take that entire part of the limb
out.
In your minds eye be thinking about that
angle of going out instead of up.
You'll look for those types of cuts.
You'll notice that this is the lateral
branch, of the technique I was just
speaking of. I didn't come up a long
distance and cut it off and leave the stub
there. Little stubs whether they're small
or big quickly die because there's no
leaves on there that part of the tree.
Try and get those cut as close as you can.
The leaves will grow out here will keep
this part nourished in the summer.
Eventually this will heal over.
That's the type of cut.
[Lady] What about the little tiny things.
[Jody] Like these?
[Lady] Yeah, no, right there at, this kind
of a thing right here, you just leave them
[Jody] Just leave them. Particularly
important to leave them. Let's talk about
what they are. These are spurs.
If you look right here, at this point
right here, you see this circular end,
that's the wood that grew last year.
The year before that it grew there to
right here. You can see that circular area
again, those are bud scars. So you know a
year ago, two years ago, three years ago,
this was four years ago, and this was
probably five years ago back to there.
So these are four years old, this is where
the fruits produced.
If you want to thin your trees, and you're
having too many apples produced.
You can do what's called spur pruning.
Where you can come in and take these
off, but remember these are about five
years old. It's taken five years to
develop that little itty bitty spur.
But this will be swelling here in the
next few days, we've had such a cold
spring that you don't see much swelling
yet. In another three weeks, this will
be the apple blossom itself. This is where
the fruit will be produced, so we want to
be careful and don't break them off, don't
prune them off, unless you want to thin
your apples.
When you make the cut, if you can, you
want to make it a quarter of an inch after
the branching.
[Lady]So I want to go out a little further
[Jody] Go out just a little further, you
don't want to be too close because in the
next few weeks this will be drying out.
Sometimes if it's cut a little bit close
the buds will be desiccated by.
[Lady] You're saying to cut between the
buds not right at the buds.
[Jody] Well, kind of a cluster mind its.
[Lady] So see like he left that little bit
right there, he left that much right there
[Jody] So here's another one, again,
selecting buds or spurs. Again, this is
kind of spurring cut, this is a little
older limb.
This tree is an example of not getting
real regular pruning so it tends to
be a little bit hard to handle. So we're
whacking it back, we're gambling a little
bit, we're going try and force some of
these spurs to become wood.
And we may not be totally successful,
but that's kind of the idea.
[Lady] Thank you.
[Jody] There's the type of cut to make.
A good cut forcing the direction out there
now if you let that one go it's going to
go sideways in the tree. So you come in
and take that part and cut it off, forcing
it to go that way. Here's one that's been
cut previously, the direction of the
growth will go that way. These are spurs
this is coming this way, so I'm going to
take that one off.
This is a good cut to have made,
a lateral branch, a lateral bud,
controlling that.
Anything that's up, what's the rule about
stuff sticking straight up.
[Ladies] Cut it off.
[Jody] That's right. Like that. Here's
another one sticking straight up.
[Lady] So like this one I could cut that
straight off.
[Jody] Yup.