Yesterday, I pruned my nectarine tree, the three butterfly bushes, and did some tinkering with the apple and cherry trees.
The butterfly bushes (buddleia or sometimes called buddleja) are easy — you just chop ’em down to about 12″ high. They’re just a clump of old stubs now. But soon, new stalks will rise from the clump, and they’ll quickly get six feet tall in summer. Last year, I waited too long, and I think the sap had risen through all the old branches, and I lost a lot of the plants’ energy by chopping off those branches. They seemed like they weren’t going to come back for a while.
The nectarine tree needs serious pruning every year. It’s just like a peach tree — you’re supposed to keep the center of the tree open for sunlight penetration to the fruit, and you need to cut out about a third of last year’s growth to promote more new growth this year. They only flower and fruit on last year’s growth, so you can’t overdo this thinning of new twigs. I cut some of the height back, but I don’t butcher my tree like a lot of peach growers do around here. I like finding the balance between an attractive shade tree and a good fruit producer. I think I have the balance pretty well. But if I let it grow much taller than it is, I’d start only getting new wood in the top canopy and only getting fruit up high. By taking the height down some, I will promote new growth in the lower canopy this year to produce next year’s fruit. I think it came out well. I should take a photo and post it here.
On the apples and cherries, I don’t need to work with such precision, because they flower on old wood, so it’s not a concern to constantly be taking out some of last year’s growth. I removed some branches crossing other branches or going throught the center of the trees. I also removed some “hangers” — branches that grow downward and then curve back up. I headed back some of the long upright branches to control the height, too. It’s not always good to just cut those back to the height you want, because a bunch of branches will grow out just below where you cut. So you have to be careful and think about where you want to promote more branching. I’m not sure I have it all done right, but like I said, these trees are more forgiving because they flower on old wood.