Pruning fruit trees

We have a small orchard here at La Pasera, well Luis tells me that 6 or more trees makes an orchard, so we must have. We have about 12 trees ranging from apple, plum, pear and peach and about another 6 or 7 more wild cherry, orange, nuts and avocado. The orchard part of the garden needed pruning so that we can maximise fruit production. The fruit bushes: gooseberry, red and black current will also be pruned very soon. The raspberry and blackberry are already pruned and trained.

Luis set about the younger trees that fruited for the first time, last year. Some of the pruning is to shape the tree at this young age, to keep the fruit at a sensible height and to encourage fruiting spurs. It might affect this year's crop but it'll be worth it in the end.

We have two very old apple trees that have been neglected for many years, part of the original orchard where the house is now built. We need to make decisions soon on how to manage these as the first drastic prune prompted turbo charged growth resulting in the trees growing unacceptably high. They are really passed their best but being such mature trees, they look integrated with the garden and add some welcome shade in summer., besides, Wentworth and Gawber use them for play-fights and viewing platforms.

Looking forward to our first oranges