How can I rehabilitate a fruit tree (to make the fruit good again)?
Question:I just moved into a house that has lovely peach, plum, and pear trees planted on the lot. There is no doubt from my initial examination that the fruits have become crabby and aren't any good for eating this season. They are on the small side and likely to be sour.
What can I start doing now to rehabilitate these trees so that the fruit will eventually (next season, or multiple seasons from now if needed) return to being large and good enough to eat? Is there special fertilizer for fruit trees that is generally available? Any other tricks to know?
Any idea how long (how many seasons) rehabilitating a "wild" fruit tree might take?
Thanks!
Answers:
Well, you may need to do nothing at all. Sometimes it's just the weather conditions a particular year. Sometimes the tree has too many fruits.
Also, take a look for graft scars. Some people think they can just plant seeds from the fruit they get from the store and get good fruit trees. Someone may have done this a long time ago and you may simply have bad trees. It's not likely, but it is a possibility to consider if you end up having the same problem year after year. You can also end up with a virus or other disease problems if the orchard has been neglected for a long time.
The best thing is to keep it properly pruned. Some fertilizer is OK, but it doubtful that's your problem. Pruning is very important. Too much fruit creates a couple of problems. One is each fruit turns out to be "crabby" as you put it because each fruit individually isn't getting enough resources from the tree. But you can also get into alternating patterns of one year having way too many fruits, then having almost none the next. Pruning helps prevent this.
You can get a lot of information from the Home Orchard Society. See the link below.
Trim all the centre branches and open the centre of the tree to sun.Use a good spray to kill bugs and ask a grower what fertilizer for what ever tree your working with.
Pruning fruit trees is relatively easy, but each species has its own requirement to get the best fruit. The attached link will get you started.
We have many plum and peach orchards here in Central texas..by rule the orchard growers cut thier trees completely back to where the main trunk comes up and meets the first set of multiple branches, about 4 feet above the main divide.They do this every 7 years. here is a site that concerns when adn how to prune them..the mentioned above is not called pruning ..it is called cutting them back..so pruning as discussed here is an annual thing, but a 'total cut back' is to be done every 7..You have just moved in there so i would assume they have not been taken care of prior to this.. i think late february would be a good time to do a 'cut back" on it.Nothing can be done to increase quality and yield this season..a cutback will give you a fresh start for next season though
http://www.ext.vt.edu/pubs/treefruit/422...
pruning it is good, and a must, i also had the same problem with my fruit trees do to years of neglect and the one thing i noticed was WATER! WATER! WATER! lots of it, just poak some holes around the dirt surrounding the trees to let the water soak in and add some fruit tree food fertalizer, you can get it at walmart and jsut water them every other day to 3 or 4 times a week, it may take a year or more but for me it worked and i have the most wonderful plums and pears now!
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