Terms, schemes and types of autumn pruning of apricot
The meaning of autumn pruning
Without enough light, the fruit loses its taste. Light shade is considered optimal for a good harvest. Formative pruning should be done two years after the young seedlings are planted, or after one season. You can start such pruning when the apricot has successfully overwintered. They do it for the convenience of harvesting fruits. The crown is made low so that you can get the fruits from the top step of the portable ladder.
Care must be taken to avoid disappointment when harvesting. We do not recommend neglecting trifles, since the apricot is very capricious. This operation is carried out both in the spring and in the fall. In spring, the peach is pruned to form a natural crown so that it is comfortable to look after the tree, spray and harvest the fruit. What are the benefits of pruning? Thanks to her, fruits grow large and appetizing. 
For the successful cultivation of a garden apricot, you need to take good care of it. It is important to know that apricot is very light-requiring. It has thick branches that remain very flexible. In order to prevent the crown from growing at the tree, pruning is carried out as quickly as possible. Sometimes the procedure is done for an adult tree. This procedure is carried out to rejuvenate the tree, preventing oversaturation of the crown with new branches. How to prune correctly? The process is shown in the video below.
Some tips:
- It is best to trim the juice after the movement.
- Stumps should not be left as they can cause disease.
- The choice of tool depends on the size of the tree. You can use a pruner, a hacksaw, or a knife, but the wood should not be ripped or cut with a blunt knife.
- Removing old branches, the cuts are processed with garden varnish.
Before that, he is heated in a water bath. A mature plant must be thinned out, and then the shoots that do not develop correctly are removed. Young shoots are cut in the spring, up to half, and the procedure is repeated in the summer. If the crown is dense, then incorrectly growing parts are removed.
Tool
Rejuvenating an old tree can be a daunting task, since the fruits generally grow only at the top, and in that place the crown is very thickened, the branches can be diseased or dry. First, excess branches are removed and the crown is freed from oversaturation. Thus, the light hits the fruiting part of the tree.
For a full-fledged work, and this is especially important for an old tree, which can be very difficult to cut, you need to prepare the following tools:
- Garden shears or knife
- Secateurs
- Garden var
- A device for warming up a garden var
- Hacksaw
- Ladder
Having such tools, it will be much easier to work, and there is no better way to form the crown and help the tree to develop correctly than to prevent crown density and work on pruning it. This should be done with a healthy plant, where the summer growth is from 40 cm.You can verify the correct application of the described tools for your garden in the video at the end of the recording.
Trimming scheme
Formative pruning makes it possible to give the crown a certain shape. It also stimulates the growth of branches and makes it possible to get fruits earlier than usual.
Diagram of apricot crown formation
Regulatory pruning maintains the harvest at the previously obtained level. Rejuvenating pruning is done to enhance the growth of branches, stimulate the appearance of young shoots, and normalize the load of the crop. It also protects the fruit from deterioration in quality.
Scheme of pruning apricot by year
Restorative pruning is used to protect wood from mechanical damage or from freezing in the cold season. Very often, different schemes, methods and types of trimming are combined to obtain the best quality result. The main purpose of cutting branches from an apricot tree is to form the crown. New shoots are removed every year. Any pruning method should be carried out according to the established scheme, and each of these schemes must be known to the gardener.
If the sparse-tiered method is used most often to form the crown, then there are cases when another can be applied. One of them is a method in which a crown is formed in a limited area. This method is also called flattening. Crown formation is done by growing 5-7 branches at regular intervals. Flattening is used when it is necessary to get fruits from an apricot very early. The exact sequence of actions is shown in the video.
Apricot differs from other crops in that it does not shed the ovary on its own, and the fruits ripen from a larger number of inflorescences. The peculiarity of the fruit tree can cause congestion with its fruits, and as a result, even after some time, the culture is depleted, and the branches break off. To maintain balance in the fall, excess outgrowths are removed. Both the shaping and rejuvenating crown creation procedure will work on their own in this case.
In the fall, pruning is done in mid-October. Autumn is the time when not all apricot varieties are cut, but only the earliest ones. To restore growth, a strong pruning of perennial wood is carried out. In the second or third year after planting, one third of the branches are removed using a sparse tiered system. Also, gardeners recommend pinching the main branches as soon as 12-15 leaves appear on them. The longest fruit branches are shortened, their length should be 50 cm. For cutting, they take a knife or saw, and the cuts are done very carefully. After pruning, the places are processed with garden varnish.
Video "Rejuvenating Apricot Pruning"
A note on how to properly prune an old tree to prolong its life and improve its yield.