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Fruit size, quality and pest management are influenced by training and pruning. Untrained and unpruned trees become entangled masses of shoots and branches that produce little or no fruit and harbor insects and diseases. Training begins at planting and may be required for several years. Pruning is an annual management practice.
Two basic pruning cuts are heading and thinning. Heading or heading back removes the terminal portion of shoots or limbs. Thinning removes an entire shoot or limb to its point of origin on the main branch or lateral. Light pruning can be performed throughout the growing season to remove broken, injured or diseased branches and to improve air circulation to control foliar diseases.
Major removal of twigs and branches should be done during the dormant season, preferably before active growth begins in the spring. Training and pruning procedures vary according to the type, age and variety of fruit crop. The types of branching involved in pruning are illustrated below.
Stubs or broken branches. Downward-growng branches D. Rubbing or criss-crossing branches E. Shaded interior branches F. Competing leaders G. Narrow crotches H. The day apple trees are planted is the day to begin to train and prune for future production. Too often backyard growers plant apple trees and leave them untended for several years. This neglect results in poor growth and delayed fruiting. Apple trees are trained to a modified leader system.
The tree should be trained with one central leader or main trunk in the center, with several wide-angled limbs spaced around the leader. The tree should mature to a pyramidal shape. Experts at the University of Maine Cooperative Extension say pruning them at this time helps to protect their winter hardiness and health. If your pear desperately needs a trim though, late summer is an option, say the experts at the Maine Extension. To keep your tree as healthy as possible, cut back dead or diseased branches, or limbs that are rubbing against each other, once a year.
Do you want to train it into a shape ideal for bearing large yields of high-quality fruit year after year?
Or would you rather it grow with a more natural look, potentially at the expense of a larger harvest? Since pears tend to grow straight up, the central leader shape honors the way pears like to grow while also maximizing light exposure to the lower and middle branches, which helps promote fruit production and quality.
But first, a few tips and notes on equipment. Fiskars Bypass Pruners. Use a sharp pair of bypass pruners for young specimens and small branches. I like these from Fiskars, which are available from the Home Depot.
For older trees with thick limbs, use a pruning saw like this one from Fiskars, also available from the Home Depot. Fiskars Pruning Saw. Always cut about an inch above an outward-facing lateral bud, which allows a new branch to grow outward rather than crossing back inward toward the trunk. For branches that curve upward, make an angled cut so that water can easily run off the open wound. For boughs that stick straight out, a straight cut works well.
You can learn more general tips in our guide to the basics of pruning. Your goal here is to allow the trunk to grow straight upward, and to create two to three sets of strong scaffolding branches growing outward from the center.
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