[Scpg] -SBOrgGdn- Re: [sbperm] No pruning may offer best roses, fruit crops?

Sat Dec 27 14:44:20 PST 2008

I too suspected as much.  I have noticed that (most) pruned fruit trees
produce far less fruit than their unpruned counterparts.  They are also
exposed to disease at the cut.  The only advantages I see to pruning
are for increased fruit size (less fruit means bigger individual
fruits, but overall less weight per tree) and the obvious like crossing limbs or to keep the tree small.

My mom never prunes her roses and they are the healthiest plants I have seen.  She gets flowers all year in Ojai (still blooming).  

In my opinion, the most common mistake in pruning (besides pruning too much) is timing.  The time of year is very important in how the plant will respond to the pruning.  We have all seen a tree send out a million shoots at the spot it was pruned.  I think this is because it was pruned at the wrong time.

Loren Luyendyk
(805) 452-8249
www.sborganics.com
www.surferswithoutborders.org

CC: sbogc at yahoogroups.com; Fossil-Free-Landscaping at googlegroups.com; Scpg at arashi.com; crfgvsb at gmail.com; Beardtropics at earthlink.net
To: sbperm2006 at googlegroups.com
From: odell at silcom.com
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 10:44:55 -0800
Subject: -SBOrgGdn- Re: [sbperm] No pruning may offer best roses, fruit crops?

            Excellent news! I suspected as much. There's another study that  

proved that unpruned trees (natives and ornamentals, not fruit trees)  

do better in winds because the leaves and branchlets absorb the  

energy of the wind. Traditionally pruned ornamental trees, thinned to  

"take the sail out," had problems with loss of major limbs and  

overturning, whereas the same kinds of trees growing in a natural  

unpruned state did not.

What makes us think we can outsmart millions of years of slow, steady  

evolution towards the optimal forms of organisms? Seems to me that  

it's a product of the human need to control everything, not backed up  

by good science. Much of conventional horticulture is of a similar  

origin, and is similarly unsupported by any scientific evidence. I  

applaud any effort to learn what really is going on, and to better  

understand our role in the care of our plants and garden ecosystems.  

I suspect that we have much to learn.

Pruning to control size is a similarly dubious idea, made necessary  

by placement of a plant in a space not adequate for its ultimate  

size. Under normal circumstances, the only pruning that really makes  

sense (off the top of my head) is 1.) removing crossing, damaged,  

weak or otherwise truly troublesome branches, 2.) minor corrections  

to young trees in order to develop a good branching structure, and  

3.) safety pruning to remove branches that might become a hazard.  

Pruning should be done from the inside, not from outside. There are  

exceptions to this information, of course, such as espaliered trees,  

sheared hedges (only where there is no other solution to the problem  

of screening), and perhaps controlling the size of fruit trees where  

we intentionally have placed them in too small a space on the  

principle that it's better to do so and enjoy the fruit that to have  

nothing simply because our land isn't big enough to accommodate fully- 

developed trees.

I love to prune and it's hard not to dive in and clean up a badly  

structured plant. I'm as much of a control freak as any gardener (we  

really do love to play God, don't we?), and I work to control my own  

instincts in this regard. I note that there is a call for volunteers  

to prune the roses at the Mission; I wonder what would happen if this  

information were made available to them? It's really hard to tell  

people that everything they know is wrong, but sometimes it's the  

best thing in the long run.

Owen

On Dec 24, 2008, at 9:46 AM, LBUZZELL at aol.com wrote:

> Before you do any winter pruning, please read this article!

>

> Gregg Lowery of Vintage Gardens in Sebastopol, CA has written a  

> very important article about the scientific evidence that now  

> contradicts traditional procedures for rose pruning.  This article  

> may also have relevance for how we prune fruit trees, since roses  

> are members of the rosaceae family which includes many fruit trees.

>

> In short, the British rose society did experimental trials on three  

> methods: traditional pruning, trimming with hedge trimmers and no  

> pruning at all.  The winner in terms of health and bloom was -- you  

> guessed it -- no pruning at all.  The British rosarians were in an  

> uproar!!!  How could it be possible that the plants know better  

> than people how to do their job?

> \

> We may still choose to prune for size, of course -- but we need to  

> know that we're not helping the health of the plant by doing so,  

> and a gentle hand is needed.

>

> http://www.vintagegardens.com/PDF/Vintage%20Newsletter%2012_19_08.pdf

>

> Happy holidays,

> Linda

>

>

>

> One site keeps you connected to all your email: AOL Mail, Gmail,  

> and Yahoo Mail. Try it now.

>

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