Autumn Garden Pruning

Pruning trees and shrubs is an integral part of gardening. Without it, you can't get good harvests, you can't keep the trees healthy. Therefore, a sharp pruner and a handy garden saw should be the gardener's best friend and always be ready.

Content:

Types of trimming
Autumn pruning
What can you prune in the fall?
Autumn pruning rules
General rules for pruning

Types of trimming

In general, pruning can be divided into three main types: formative, sanitary and anti-aging. Each of them has its own goals, is produced according to certain rules and in separate terms.

Formative pruning focuses on tree formation and is more commonly applied to young plants. But not only … Including the methods of shortening and thinning, it provides an increase in the penetration of light into the crown, improves its ventilation, controls growth, stimulates fruit formation and the development of lateral shoots.

In most cases it is used in the spring, but for some shrubs it is recommended in the fall. In addition to the above, formative pruning can include the removal of shoots growing inside the crown, sagging to the ground, intertwining with each other.

Sanitary pruning involves removing diseased, broken and dried branches. It is produced regardless of the season (in spring, summer, and autumn), since the quality of the crop, and the full development of plants, and sometimes their life span, depend on the timeliness of the methods applied.

Rejuvenating pruning aims to stimulate the growth of new shoots and free the plants from shoots that have lost the potential to set flower buds. For each culture, it has its own indicators. In most cases it is produced in the spring. In autumn, it can be used only in the southern regions and in relation to berry bushes.

Autumn pruning

As mentioned above, autumn pruning is not acceptable for all regions. The north and middle lane are distinguished by rather harsh winter conditions and therefore, if trees are cut there in the fall, the wood at the cut site dries up during the period of persistent frosts, the bark freezes over, which negatively affects the entire plant as a whole. And one- and two-year-old seedlings risk dying altogether.

However, sanitary pruning, which includes the removal of diseased, dried out and damaged branches, can be carried out in these regions in the fall.

In the south, autumn pruning is not only not contraindicated, but is also recommended in order to unload the spring period. But, if there are prolonged frosts in the microregion with temperatures lower than -5 ° C, then it is worth postponing work there too.

What can you prune in the fall?

Frost-resistant and low-growing fruit varieties are more or less well tolerated by pre-winter pruning. Of the crops recommended for autumn pruning, one can single out: gooseberries, currants, honeysuckle, raspberries, blackberries, grapes (in the covering area), lemongrass, actinidia, viburnum.

Autumn pruning of gooseberries and currants

Someone prefers to prune currants and gooseberries in the spring, but these crops have early flowering and therefore pruning in the spring is risky for them.

Autumn pruning of gooseberries and currants involves the removal of branches inclined to the ground, growing inside the bush and outgrowing reproductive age. If the plant is severely neglected, in the first autumn it is rejuvenated, the next autumn it is completed. An important rule in this case is the removal of no more than one third of the branches at a time.

When rejuvenating currant bushes, it is necessary to remember that it is advisable to leave fruit-bearing branches in black currants for no more than 4-5 years, in red ones up to 8. At the same time, in the latter case, rejuvenation can be partial, with a transfer to that part of the branch that still has the potential to form a crop.

Gooseberry branches can bear fruit for up to 10 years, but large fruits are obtained only with a young growth. Therefore, if a branch has a very dark bark, it is cut out, making room for a new one. In order to obtain high yields from gooseberries, everything older than 5 years is removed.

When pruning gooseberries and currants, it is necessary to carefully examine the cuts - if a black center is found on the branches, they are cut out completely, to the ground, and then burned, as this is a sign of damage to the plant by currant glass.

Autumn pruning of raspberries and blackberries

Autumn pruning is also used on raspberries, but only if the cleaning of the raspberry for some reason was not done earlier. New shoots are shortened, old shoots that have matured and thicken the bush are removed.

In regions with a cold climate, the entire aerial part of the remontant varieties is often removed. However, current guidelines guide gardeners towards more convenient and productive methods of culture formation, which are carried out in the summer and spring.

But blackberries, on the contrary, need autumn pruning. After harvesting, it is thinned out, leaving no more than 10 branches per bush, cleaned of fruit-bearing shoots, cut out whips with unripe wood, and all that remains for the next year is shortened by 30% to stimulate the formation of peduncles.

Autumn pruning of grapes

Autumn terms of pruning grapes are recommended mainly for the northern regions. Pruned grapes are easier to cover for the winter and easier to care for in spring.

Pruning can be done after the first small frosts, clearing perennial branches from weak shoots, shortening the matured one-year growth to 2-6 buds (depending on the variety, shoot thickness and growing area of the bush) and forming replacement knots. Young plants are left to form in spring.

Autumn pruning of lemongrass and actinidia

For lemongrass and actinidia, fall is also the best time to prune. During this period, they are thinned out, cleaned and shaped.

Autumn pruning of honeysuckle

Honeysuckle is also subject to autumn pruning. During these periods, thinning is carried out in her, and shoots older than 7 years are also removed, leaving hemp about 5 cm to resume growth.

Autumn pruning of viburnum

If viburnum grows in the garden, you can cut it off in the fall. From viburnum, dried, damaged branches are removed, as well as those that thicken the crown.

Autumn pruning of fruit

Despite the fact that fruit trees are recommended for pruning in the spring, some techniques can still be applied to them in the fall. First, this is cutting dead branches. Secondly, they are heavily shaded, giving a very poor harvest.

In the spring, such branches will be difficult to find, but in the fall, when picking fruits, they are just clearly visible. However, remembering that a fresh wound is a conductor of cold, live, but not fruiting branches are cut into a thorn, about 15 cm high, which is completely removed in spring.

Autumn pruning rules

Before proceeding with the autumn pruning, you must wait for the sap flow to stop, which is easy to determine by the fallen leaves. But it is also impossible to postpone the procedure until later.

If in the fall the method of rejuvenation was used on berry bushes, in the spring such plants should receive special attention.

General rules for pruning

There are general rules for pruning, the application of which ensures the correct cut of the branches, its speedy overgrowth and facilitates the gardener's work:

Pruners and saws must always be sharpened and disinfected.
When removing large branches, they are cut into a ring, without leaving a hemp in place of the cut, without making a deepening, but an even neat cut along the trunk or skeletal branch, not affecting the annular ridge.
When cutting off thick branches or branches, first make a notch on the underside of the intended cut, and then finish the branch from above. This not only facilitates and speeds up the process (the branch deflects under its own weight, helping to pass the blade deeper), but also keeps the bark and the layer of wood under the cut from tearing.
Cutting out an old or thick shoot under the root, with one hand they hold the pruner at the required level, parallel to the ground, with the other, they deflect the branch strictly perpendicular to the cut.
When caring for trees, it is not recommended to make more than two large cuts at a time.
Slices sawn with a file are leveled with a sharp knife and processed with garden pitch.
When pruning plants, it must be remembered that the more pruning is done, the more intensive the growth of new shoots will be, and vice versa.
If several branches compete with each other, developing in one direction, the weak is removed, the strong is oriented towards uniform development in the vacated space.
Pruning work is carried out only during the hibernation of plants, but at a temperature not lower than -8 ° C.

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