So, you're ready to trim your fruit trees huh? You've got everything you need. Sharp trimmers, check. Alcohol spray to disinfect your trimmers, check. Pruning spray, check. A gung ho resolve, check. Ten trees in, you're doing great, you've had to make some tough cuts but you know it's all for the better. Twenty trees in, you just happen to look back at the trees you've cut and then look forward to the trees that need to be cut, and you start questioning your methods. Thirty trees in, you're trying to recall the videos that you watched four times straight before you came out here in the first place. Enter lesson* ONLY TRIM TREES FOR AN HOUR!
Pear tree predicament. The planting of the pear trees was in phase 2 (year 2) of our planting schedule. We got bigger trees in phase 2 because we wanted relative size and age. The problem was that NONE of our labor showed up! Thanks to a neighbor and some new people I now call friends, we were able to get all the fruit trees in the ground just in time but it took longer than I had anticipated, so I ran out of time to prune. Most trees were fine, they have a natural propensity to spread out their bran
ches and missing a prune here and there early was just fine. However, the pear trees if not cut the first year, will branch out in very tightly grouped branches. I trimmed last year, however, I was in the above stages of doubt. So, the important cuts did not get made. Fast forward to this year, the tough cuts can't be avoided anymore. Cut ten trees. Go inside. Watch a video. Cut ten trees. Go inside. Watch a video, and so on, till all 100 pears are cut. Lesson* DON'T LOOK BACK!
OK, well, I've got to get back at it. See you in ten trees. JK. Happy farming.
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