Once they've been trained, in principle there's not much difference between pruning espalier fruit trees and conventional fruit trees. Ours are about 30 years old and have already been well-trained, so they now simply need to be maintained. The trees are so long-established that they also no longer need to be attached to the trellis.
The first principle is maintaining the shape when seen from all sides. This means that when seen from the front, there shouldn't be more than 4 to 5 strong horizontal branches on each side of the trunk. In our case, the trees hadn't been pruned for a while and were already developing additional branches, often protruding to the front or back instead of to the side. They had to go. Click photos to enlarge.
Another thing that had to go were the long vertical shoots along the top of the espaliers that make them look like they have "hair". Here an example of an unpruned "hairy" tree.
Seen from the side, you want to maintain the "flatness" of the row of trees. Keeping this in mind also helps in deciding what to remove.
As with other fruit trees, it's important to thin out twigs that interfere with each other, and to make the cuts just above eyes or branches pointing in the direction that you want the tree to develop in.
Here there are too many twigs:
Here's what it should look like after clean-up:
Here are some examples of finished trees. You can get a feel for how much was cut off if you click to enlarge. I was a little dismayed, but now, a month later, the trees are about to burst into blossom and they look just great. I'll post some photos of when they're in full bloom.
Pruning trees is definitely a hard work. And knowledge is most important.
ReplyDeleteWe have pruned our fruit trees also, but we hired professionals to do that.
Your pruned trees to look lovely, you have done a great job.
I have always loved the look of espalier trees. It will be wonderful to watch your trees this year with you.
ReplyDeletePrunning such a big tree is certainly hard work, needs a lot of strength and patience. My garden is too small for a tree, so I only get to practise prunning on my bushes and shrubs. I wish I have a tree as big as yours in my garden too.
ReplyDeleteBarbara, what great (and very clear) pictures of the pruning. Thanks for the step by step, the trees look great!
ReplyDeleteHello Barbara. I think I would be too much of a sook to keep espaliered fruit trees properly trained. I hesitate too much to cut thinks off! But I am looking forward to the photos of the trees in bloom!
ReplyDeleteKeep me away from shears...but, you are an expert! The espaliered fruit trees look great. It would be nice NOT to be afraid to cut on a small tree...I may have to try to learn. gail
ReplyDeleteThey do look great. Pruning is something I love to do but I haven't tried espaliering. Can't wait to see the blooms and apples!
ReplyDeleteP.S. I left info about seed starting the magnolias in the comment section of my blog. Too long to rewrite. I checked Dirr and put info from him there since I've not tried to start them. Good luck to your friends.
Barbara, thank you for your sharing. This post is so interesting. I haven't heard of espalier before, but only till I read this post. So then I checked it in Wikipedia and I found this amazing! I definitely would like to give it a try if I have a garden big enough for me to do so :)
ReplyDeleteBarbara, This is a very informative post, thank you. An espaliered fruit tree is on my "must do" list.
ReplyDeleteVery nice post. I've always been rather intimidated by the maintenance required for espaliered trees, and relieved we have room to just let them grow here. However, this is a very informative post, and even in a large garden there are places where an espalier would be perfect. Can't wait to see your trees in full bloom.
ReplyDeleteSuch a useful post, Barbara!
ReplyDeleteLiebe Barbara, ein wunderschönes Spalier hast Du da im Garten! Ich habe auch in meinem Kleingarten ein Birnenspalier angelegt und hatte einiges zu lernen, bis ich verstanden habe, wie man es schneidet. Ich wünsche Dir noch viel Spaß im Frühlingsgarten am Rheindamm!!! Liebe Grüße von Luzia.
ReplyDeleteNice, sort of like cutting hair, only tougher...
ReplyDeleteI'm intimidated by my fruit trees. When my full-sized plum needed pruning, I had our tree guy do it. You have more courage than I do. BTW, are you affected by the Iceland volcano eruption?
ReplyDeleteThose finished trees have great structure...I wonder what a heavy snow load does to the horizontal branches?
ReplyDeleteChristine in Alaska, with no fruit trees yet
Hi Barbara. I am not sure if you will even see this....I happened upon your blog while looking for an allotment garden of my own in MA. Last weekend I went to the Waldorf kindergarten and eventually found the gardens. I loved it!! I can't believe there is such a gem in a metro city like this. Anyway, I was going to head over to the office next week to talk to them about it, and I was wondering if you could answer some questions for me. I saw a few that were for sale or were just neglected (! yay!) so we are really excited!! Thanks!
ReplyDeletejilliancunrod@yahoo.com
These look amazing. It looks like a lot of hard work but espaliers are definitely worth it. I found yur blog by accident but really enjoyed it - lots of inspirational advice! I'll be back for more!
ReplyDeleteGreat post on pruning and you are right that much of the same applies to all trees when pruning. I so admire your trees! It is a constant chore to keep the "hair" from growing wild. ;>)
ReplyDeleteBeautiful tree!
ReplyDeleteWill need some sharp cutters.
ReplyDelete