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Plum and Green Gage Pruning
februarysgirl
Posts: 835
in Fruit & veg
Back in December '19 I planted a Victoria plum, a Czar plum and an Old Green Gage. All on pixy rootstock (although I have my doubts about the Czar plum) and all 2 years old at the time. I let them be last summer as they hadn't been in the ground (well, open bottomed raised beds) that long so have been looking to prune them this year. I've taken off all of the lower branches which were spoiling the look and some of the really obvious ones that were crossing. As the following photos will show, they've all grown a little haphazardly.
Victoria Plum.
Green Gage
Czar Plum (you can see why I have doubts about the pixy rootstock)
As you can see, they're a little on the wild side and need reigning in but I have no idea how much I should be taking off of the branches.
Pruning advice would be gratefully received!
Also, apologies for all the photos.
Victoria Plum.
Green Gage
Czar Plum (you can see why I have doubts about the pixy rootstock)
As you can see, they're a little on the wild side and need reigning in but I have no idea how much I should be taking off of the branches.
Pruning advice would be gratefully received!
Also, apologies for all the photos.
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Posts
I've watched a few YouTube videos but am finding it difficult to apply the techniques to my trees beyond removing lower and crossing branches.
The Czar is absolutely loaded with plums although I don't know how. I wasn't expecting any as it's a relatively young tree and it fruited last year. It has an awful lot of leaf curl 😬 My green gage hasn't fruited well this year and annoyingly, a lot of what was there was on the lower branches that needed to be removed. Gutted.
If you do the summer cut now you will reduce them as long as the cuts go into the bin straight away.
To shape a plum you have to decide first what that is, and how tall you wish it to become. And yes even on dwarf root stock it will still put out 4/6 feet of growth. You do realise they will need 6 feet of space to grow into each.
The one with the house behind is a lovely shape, just needs the limbs reduced by half.
The others need to be trained. I used bricks on the end of strings to hold the branches at the angle I wanted, for a year, which set them at that shape, then cut back the side stems to three buds.
This is March two years ago. After the strings had been removed, pruned to a Christmas tree shape, which I have kept at about 7 foot, it is a victoria plum on dwarf root.
Thought I would show this picture as at pruning time you can't see the tree for the leaves.😁
I think I'd be even more drastic with the greengage. After all, you don't (presumably) want a 20ft tree, so it makes sense to try to take it down to a height where you might conceivably be able to pick the fruit in future. The following Youtube clip is interesting because the guy has removed the leading stem down to about 4ft, by the looks of things.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rV1k7TEqND0
@purplerallim I love your approach to training, I'll definitely give your technique a go. I inadvertently "shaped" the Victoria plum during the winter. I put a fleece jacket over it and the green gage (wasn't one big enough for the Czar) and the branches got a little misshapen. What time of year would you recommend putting weight on the branches?
@Liriodendron The thickening of branches is one thing I was wondering about as a lot of the branches are really weedy and I was worried about the effect future fruit would have on them. Alas, I'm only 4ft 10 so the height can't be crazy.
Thank you all for your advice!
We have a 30ft cooking apple in this garden. I only pick the apples from the bottom few feet, which is a waste... except the fruit higher up feeds the wildlife!