How to Prune a Peach Tree and the Tools You Need
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Published July 15, 2019
Many people are going out and enjoying the fruits of nature more, quite literally. Sweet peaches have made their way worldwide, and the number of orchard visitors seems to grow yearly. Through proper steps and tools, planting and learning how to prune a peach tree will turn into a tasty reward.
The concept of homesteading and home gardening is becoming increasingly popular. However, many beginners don’t know where to start regarding peach tree care.
The task of pruning is vital to consistent and delectable fruits. Before creating an annual routine, let’s establish what pruning is and how to prune a peach tree effectively.
What Is Pruning?
Predominantly, pruning removes unwanted growths that prohibit healthy plant growth. Annual pruning critically manages these plants for better results later on. With peaches, pruning contributes to the process of making these delicious fruits.
Nonetheless, fertilization, pest control, and irrigation remain imperative to regular orchard practices. With these tasks, alongside learning how to prune a peach tree, an orchard should thrive and reap great produce.
Within the United States, many regions take different variations in pruning and caring for their orchards. The care and pruning practices sometimes create different textures and flavors for a specific grove. Regardless, there are several general steps that the majority of gardeners follow.
To become a great pruner, you must learn the basics of plants and how they grow. With specific pruning cuts, a tree may react positively or negatively. Armed with the knowledge of the plant's natural growth, the goal of yielding high-quality produce comes a bit closer.
The Goal
The objective of most tree pruning is to get rid of the old and dead parts that could affect the rest of the plant. According to some studies, removing 40 percent of the tree develops new, healthy growth in the spring. Younger red-bearing shoots that range from 18 inches to 24 inches are helpful and should not be removed.
Secondly, pruning lowers the height, or fruiting zone, to make harvesting by hand a bit easier. Low fruiting zones also create a norm of picking fruits on the ground, which leaves behind less waste.
Through pruning, we also aim to increase air ventilation, reduce disease, and get sunlight to hit all the right places. Moreover, fruit color and taste arrive more quickly through proper pruning habits and routines.
Benefits of Peach Tree Pruning
A practical and safe yearly maintenance habit yields a multitude of benefits for peach trees. Learning and practicing how to prune a peach tree will impact the health and size of the trees and peaches.
Pruning is a peach grower’s strategy for maintaining consistency among their trees. By removing tall and shady branches, the height of the trees will be uniform and manageable for harvest time. A peach harvested from a tree that produced too many fruits may feel premature and untasty.
Therefore, the benefits of peach tree pruning before the season arrives prevents weak branches from bearing fruit at all. Pruning beforehand may create more work in the present, but it will help manage what comes to fruition.
Your peach trees may look thinner now, but this will provide suitable space for healthy growth. Remember, pruning those branches with height gives way for sunlight to enter the center of the tree. With a specific shape, peaches could grow lower for easier access when ready to pick.
Perfect Pruning Conditions
For most plants, we know to hydrate them and ensure that critters stay out of the way. Not only is that important, but the type of ground, air, and water that it absorbs contributes to the final product. Trees that don’t hit all of these marks age rapidly and produce unappealing peaches.
With ideal timing and environment, learning how to prune a peach tree will lead to a healthy harvest. But don’t start the pruning process in the winter. If possible, don’t plan to prune if consecutive cold weather is in your forecast. Peach trees are less capable of withstanding severe weather once pruned.
Additionally, trees pruned in colder seasons create flower buds and shoots that don’t make it out alive. Commonly, damaged bark on the main branches and trunk also appears with chilly climate pruning. Plus, pruning can prove more harm than good with newly pink, plump flower buds that touch frozen condensation.
On the other hand, pruning your peach trees during or right after blooms appear isn’t the sweet spot either. Just keep in mind it’s always better to prune a tad bit later than earlier.
Some growers will mow the tops and sides outside of pruning times to keep costs at bay. Unfortunately, this doesn’t always do much and may result in weaker fruits and, thus, a low economic return.
Those who do incorporate this usually do so after harvest to reduce future harvesting height. If you do top mow, detailed pruning afterward will get rid of stubs that develop disruptive foliage.
Reaping the Harvest from Proper Pruning
The correct methods of how to prune a peach tree will benefit more than cutting corners with debatable practices. Planning the pruning schedule before harvest will help you enjoy the bountiful time instead of making late adjustments. With the right timing and technique, you’ll have delicious peaches when the time comes.
Aside from being a great snack or dish, peach trees also benefit gardeners. Peach trees are pretty easygoing and reportedly the least challenging fruit tree you can grow. They’re early risers, which means the peaches are ready before critters and diseases arrive. That’s what makes pruning timing so important.
Done right, you’ll be enjoying peaches in no time.
When to Prune Peach Trees
Pruning should be an annual event for peach tree owners. While the exact dates may differ from region to region, it’s the popular opinion that pruning should take place in early spring. Growers should aim for the time of year between the last frost and before it gets too warm.
There are many benefits to practicing how to prune a peach tree in early spring. By pruning before bloom, it’s easier to see which branches should come out without foliage in the way. Additionally, the chance of infestation reduces during early spring.
Imperatively, do not wait until the last minute of spring to prune because your peach trees could bleed excessively. Peach trees bleed sap, and sap carries nutrients throughout the tree. If pruned during the wrong part of the year, your tree may lose a good amount of nutrients through the sap it couldn’t retain.
However, it’s similarly imperative not to start the process too early, either. If you are pruning in the winter or before the last frost, it can reduce the hardiness of the trees and lower the quality of the coming year’s harvest.
If you’re only growing a few trees, a good rule of thumb to follow when learning how to prune a peach tree is to wait for buds to appear and prune before they fully bloom.
Pruning Preference
Reducing tree height and increasing light penetration to the center branches are goals for some growers, so cutting off higher-up branches is a standard action for the many benefits mentioned above.
However, research shows that if those are your intended results, it’s better to prune more vigorous and horizontal shoots that are shading the center in the summer.
The consensus amongst growers leans toward pruning when safe rather than pruning too early and getting caught in frost. While the majority of pruning occurs during early spring before bloom, some pruning for height and light control can be done after the year’s harvest.
How to Prune a Peach Tree: Step by Step
During the second year, peach trees should bloom and produce fruit after a hardy first year. As long as your peach tree doesn’t go through life-threatening disease or damage during the first, you should see those results in the second.
When learning how to prune a peach tree, remove slow, unproductive shoots and encourage those young and healthy, reddish shoots. Then, examine the shape of the entire tree for healthy growth. Afterward, many go back in to clean up any details missed.
Gardeners should take steps to learn how to prune a peach tree while setting a time within the year to begin. With the right processes and tools, pruning will help your peach tree orchard flourish. Time is of the essence with this process, so let’s go through the steps of how to prune a peach tree.
What You’ll Need to Prep for Pruning
To get started, wear long sleeves, sturdy pants, and durable boots that keep your body protected and ventilated. When learning how to prune a peach tree, you’ll want to feel comfortable enough to move around and get dirty. Bib overalls are typical to wear for men and women working in orchards.
Pruners often wear hats covering their ears to protect them from any pokes, accidents, or debris that tries to get inside. For other general safety precautions, pruners also wear eye protection and heavy-duty work gloves when cutting and handling the branches.
While everyone has their own preference, using safety wear is a prudent step, especially when working with more giant trees.
Before going out into the garden or orchard, you will need to bring the right tools to get the job done. Regular peach trees could reach around 15 feet if unmanaged, so you may need to roll out a ladder to get to the hard-to-reach places. A trimmer, a pair of shears, and a saw will be the primary tools utilized when trimming and shaping the tree.
Making the Cut
Over the years, research has shown that the collar-cut method is more effective when figuring out how to prune a peach tree.
This method has a rounded edge where the branch joins, and it promotes quick healing for the cut made. The collar cut also reduces disease, infection, and dieback.
First, begin with all of the dead, broken, or infected branches to cut out, because peaches will thrive on lively, new wood. Once you take your cutting tools to the pieces you can reach, take your ladder and prune the branches higher up.
After choosing the main branches, take out the other large branches that are growing at the center of the tree or in odd directions that aren’t going outward.
When pruning the tree, picture an open V shape with more than a few dominant branches that have space in between. Towards the end, remove any gray, inward-growing, slim branches and shoots growing horizontally.
With the refining parts, cut the red shoots leaning out and pull out suckers and sprouts by hand to prevent them from coming back.
Cut Type
When going through these intentional pruning steps, it’s essential to understand the types of cuts you are making. With heading cuts, a branch or tree limb gets their end cut along freshly planted tree trunks. It results in robust, shortened branches that encourage healthier development.
Thinning cuts remove part of a branch that attaches to the trunk or large branch. This type of cut does not contribute to inducive fruit growth. Yet, thinning cuts help manage tree size and unwanted shoots.
Finding a Feasible Height
Once you establish the kind of cuts you need, it’s essential to consider how tall your tree is for overall management and accessibility of the fruiting zone. Peach trees can grow over 2 feet a year, maxing out to 25 feet, and many will find that height unnecessary and challenging to work in all seasons.
Proper pruning strategies will help maintain your trees to a manageable size of around 12 feet so that care and fruit collection are undemanding.
For patio peach trees, you will need even less when learning how to prune a peach tree since most are around three feet tall. For these types, the treefits are typically in a container for easy care and mobility.
Reportedly, some orchard trees obtained heights well above 20 feet. Dwarf peach trees are somewhat closer to patio peach trees, going up to six feet. Again, 12 feet and under is the average ideal height for peach trees.
Making Room for an Open Center
Earlier, we discussed an open V shape for the overall tree, which is what you’ll hope to see at the end of the pruning process. Behind this method, peach trees readily conform to this model, allowing light to penetrate the tree.
Thus, the low-lying branches spread outward and watch over the pruning seasons of the tree. Careful pruning and training ensure the central wood stays in fruitful condition with younger trees. A mature peach tree adequately trained to an open center sort of looks like a circular pool float with at least five to six feet all around.
Lower trees are ideal, primarily due to the hassle of ladders and fruit weight breakage if they’re too high. You're good to go once you’ve gone through the steps to prune and shape your peach treo! Make sure to steadily water and fertilize your peach tree and keep an eye out for infestation or disease.
How to Prune a Peach Tree in Need of Restoration
You may need to cut off the entire branch for overgrown trees with peaches in unreachable places. If you aren’t finding luck with branches, look for the fresh growths that are heading in the right direction. Once you locate either, you will need to cut it back so that it appears as a dominant branch for the next season.
With the same treatment as regulated trees, routine pruning and training will make way for lower, more obtainable peaches on remedial trees.
Of course, gardeners should also remove any center shoots that are blocking light and air from these trees as well. Some extra tender loving care will get your tree back on schedule with the others.
The Pruning Payoff
With the increase of people starting to grow their own food or going out to pick it, learning how to prune a peach tree is a beneficial skill for backyard beginners and orchard owners alike.
While there are plenty of steps to take when exploring the pruning process, it is an imperative action to ensure delicious peaches. A pruned peach tree pays off for the upcoming season and for seasons to come.
Do you have any experience with peach tree pruning? Make sure to comment down below to share your knowledge!