When to Prune Apple Trees

Even though it is mid-winter there really is no time you can forget about your apple trees.  This is the perfect time of year to get outside and get pruning.

Last year we did our first pruning in the orchard.  Once again this year we decided to prune off lower limbs from the trees to make it easier to cut the grass beneath them.  There are a lot of weeds in and around our orchard and if we don't get in to trim what's on the ground it can sometimes threaten to take over.

This is what the orchard looked like when we first bought the property

Climbing nightshade is a problem for us and we need to keep those vines from growing and climbing up into the apple trees.  We also like to keep things trim for apple picking season in the fall.  It can become quite a headache trying to find apples in amongst the weeds on the ground.

Despite our best efforts the wind always takes down fruit for us.

So more low hanging branches were removed this year but we also did a little spacing of branches.  In some places the branches are so thick that it's hard for air and sun to reach inside and get to the leaves and fruit that need it.  

This waterfall of blooms was gorgeous in spring but the
branches needed to be thinned so fruit has more breathing room.

At this time of year it is easy to view the branches themselves without their green cloak and see any irregularities that might otherwise be missed. 

Numerous lower branches were removed right at
the trunk (*can you spot the mistake?*)

Before removing any branches it is important to follow the branch along its length.  Start where the branch grows out from the trunk and follow along to see where it crosses other branches or perhaps parallels them.  Some branches might appear dead toward the interior of the tree but sport lush growth at their tips.  You can see if the branch is thick or thin.  Does it look like a strong branch that would support a load of fruit or is it small and weak?  The number of buds will also be apparent giving you an idea of the branches health.  By viewing the branches as a whole you also get a sense of the structure of the tree.  

We cut back a number of branches as you can see from the debris littering the ground of the orchard.

Our main goal this year was creating some breathing room on trees that were overly crowded.  While last year we used a chainsaw and removed some major branches this year we used only a handsaw and loppers as we were working on smaller limbs in the interior of the trees.  

* When cutting branches back to the trunk you should make sure to cut them just outside the branch collar where the branch connects to the trunk.  It takes more time for a tree to seal the wound on a long stub than one that is flush with the collar.  In the picture above you can see where that wasn't done.  I'll obviously need to go back and check our work!

Tools for Apple Picking

As mentioned earlier, I never have time during apple season to write about apples but now in the dead of winter I am catching up on 'apple posts'.

One of the big questions when the apples ripen in the fall is how to get our hands on them and get them into the house.  After two seasons in the orchard we have now collected an assortment of tools to help with the apple harvest.

A trusty ladder or two is an absolute must with these old heritage trees.  Unlike new varieties that are grafted on to much smaller rootstock these old trees can grow up to heights of 30 feet and much of the best fruit is located in the sun right at the very top.

We have two different ladders which you can see above.  One obviously is rather small at 6 feet high but the benefits are you can easily carry it around and the red colour means you never forget where you put it last!  Not all fruit is located at the very top of the trees either so having a mid-sized ladder helps to access fruit lower down on a tree.

The second ladder is 17 feet when fully extended and has the benefit of a wide base which is very sturdy, and a very narrow top, which fits easily between branches.  Although it can be difficult to maneuver into place sometimes the benefits definitely outweigh the negatives.  This ladder does not tip easily and allows you to squeeze into spots that would otherwise be inaccessible.

You can clearly see how wide the base is compared to the top

Even a large ladder sometimes isn't even large enough though.  Standing on top of a 17 foot ladder means you still only reach around 22 or 23 feet.  If the tree is 30 feet tall there's still 7 feet of fruit you can't reach.

In cases like that our handiest tool is the apple picker

This very simple tool consists of metal 'fingers' that grab at the fruit pulling it into a cotton bag.  By mounting it on a long pole you can increase your fruit picking reach by several feet.  

As you can see in the above photo the picker allows me to reach up to almost double my height.  By standing on a ladder and using this picker we are able to reach fruit right around the tops of the trees.

Also important when picking apples is having a place to store them while working.  Having a bag that you can hang around your neck or across your chest is absolutely necessary, especially if you're high up on a ladder.

We use a variety of old shoulder bags or the green mesh bag in the photo above for this purpose.

And then when the bags are full we end up using every available bin to hold apples for sorting and storing.

Trugs are one of my favourite garden bins

What do you use an old wooden apple box for?  Apples of course!

It's Seed Time!

I got very excited last week as the outside temperatures became increasingly warmer and the snow began to recede.  Although I wasn't intending to start seeds indoors just yet the next thing you know I was elbow deep in seed packets and peat.  I just couldn't resist.

Last year was our first gardening season in this house and I wasn't sure what to expect in the yard so I didn't bother starting any seeds indoors.  This year though I know what plants are in the yard and what beds are available so I decided to drag out my seed equipment and dive in.

The first issue was sorting out my equipment.  My heat mat had died in the cross country move and I also sold my lighting fixture back in British Columbia.  The first thing I did was purchase a 20 x 20 inch heating mat from Lee Valley and a lighting fixture was put together by hubby.  Two fluorescent plant lights were purchased at the hardware store along with various wires and a music stand.  I'm not sure about the particulars but I'm thrilled with the results.  The light is attached to a music stand that moves up and down so I can adjust the light as the plants grow.  Very cool.

Looking up at the light fixture

With those pieces in place I was able to pull my self watering seed tray out of a box and set it up.  The deep tray is filled with water and sits on top of the heat mat.  A second plastic tray sits overtop the water and holds a watering mat which soaks up the warm water transporting it to the small propators sitting on top.  The idea is that there is a vast quantity of warm water always being provided to your seeds and less chance of them drying out and expiring.  I'm not really doing justice to the mechanics of it here but it really is a marvelous invention.  

This is a photo of the whole contraption below.

The big piece of white cardboard was a genius idea from Janet at Plantaliscious.  She talked about using a light coloured board to reflect light and make sure your seedlings grow straight and strong.  Well just as I was thinking of seedlings what should show up in the recycling at work.  Somebody was doing a presentation and when it was over they left this great big,  pre-folded board just for me to find!  The world works in mysterious ways.  Thus far it seems to be doing the trick, instead of lighting up the whole room the light hits the board and is reflected back at the seedlings.  Judging from my amaranthus (Love Lies Bleeding) seedlings below I'd say it's working well.

I admit I didn't look at the packages too closely before planting.  Bad choice.  The amaranthus germinated in 2 days and they're now an inch tall.  They will be gigantic before I can plant them out.  Should have waited a few more weeks.  There's nothing like learning through trial and error.  The basil sprouted just a day or two after the amaranthus but has yet to reach any great heights.  Hopefully they will take it slow but I probably should have waited a little longer to plant these as well.

Onions, tomatoes and mystery seeds from MIL (Dianthus?) have also been planted.  A few heirloom pink tomatoes have begun to sprout but everyone else is taking their time to join the party.  In the coming weeks I will plant more flower seeds and bring in the currants that I cold stratified outdoors and see if I can't bring them to life.  I think starting plants from seeds might possibly be my favourite aspect of gardening.  I'm always amazed at how something so tiny with a little water and warmth catches hold of life and turns into a plant.  Having a hand in that process is incredibly amazing and it's a thrill each year to look at a plant that I started from seed. 

Pruning Apple Trees in Winter

Yes that's right.  I said pruning in winter.

Although it's cold and snowy, winter is a great time to prune as the apple trees are dormant.  That means there isn't any sap flowing.


Decked out in full winter attire

If you cut while the sap is flowing it may bleed, attracting insects and bacteria which can lead to disease. In winter there are no insects and the cold doesn't allow for bacteria growth. Also consider that sap is the source of a tree's food and energy. If you prune out branches in winter, when the sap does begin to flow that energy will be directed to the branches that are intact. A tree that is pruned during summer will still send energy to a pruned branch. That energy will have nowhere to go and will result in excess vertical growth called water spouts.


Notice the water spouts at the base of this trunk, on the right side.

Another reason to prune in winter is that you want to clearly see the structure of the tree so you know exactly what branches you are removing. Cutting when the branches are bare of leaves and apples allows you to do this.

You also don't want to prune when there are apples on the tree. Falling branches can knock apples down or bruise them.

Pruning in winter doesn't come without its issues though.  We found ourselves sinking in the deep snow so we decided to strap on snowshoes.  They proved a bit difficult to manuvre in.



I now know that trying to walk backgrounds through snow while dragging heavy branches is difficult at the best of times, let alone doing it in showshoes. Perhaps waiting a few more weeks for the snow to disipate couldn't have hurt.  It is okay to wait for the weather to be more cooperative, just make sure you prune before it gets too warm.  We did this pruning almost a month ago and could still prune now in mid-March but spring is quickly approaching and I wouldn't want to wait much longer.

Now you might be wondering, didn't we prune our apple trees in November too?  It's true, we did.  At that time we were simply removing dead branches which is something you can do at any time of year.  If a branch is dead nothing more can hurt it so you can feel free to remove these branches whenever you see them.  We also removed three trees in their entirety.  Again, at this point you're killing the tree anyway so it doesn't matter when it's done.

If we removed dead branches in November you might wonder what were we pruning for now?



This tree had many low hanging branches on the left side.

Since our orchard hasn't received any attention in quite some time we were focussed on removing branches to make it more accessible and easier to maintain.  Hubby has to mow the grass around the orchard and was having a lot of difficulty.  I also found myself getting hit in the head by low branches so we attempted to remove as many of those as possible.

A small chainsaw was used to remove the large low hanging limbs.

It is important to note that you should never remove more than one third of a tree's branches at any given time when pruning.  Sometimes we forget that a large portion of a tree lives underground.  The size of the root system is in proportion to the canopy and if too much of the canopy is removed the balance is disrupted.  As noted earlier this can cause water spouts and other irregular growth. 

Many branches came down from many trees
but never more than 1/3 from a single tree.

This pruning is the first step towards renovating this old orchard.  Next year we will concentrate on pruning branches higher in the tree canopies to improve air circulation and light which will benefit fruit production.

Cleaning the Roses

The weather this weekend was sunny and clear and the snow even melted back so rather than stay indoors and clean the bathroom I decided to do some yard work.  There's one chore I've been putting off throughout the summer.  Cleaning out the rose bushes.  During the early summer our roses looked like this.

Large shrubs full of dark pink roses, they are really quite lovely but also severely overgrown.  The worst part is that they are harbouring wild raspberry canes.

If you look at the top of this photo you'll notice the curly canes sticking out of the bush.  Those are wild raspberry canes.  It's a lot easier to see them now that the leaves have fallen so it was a good time to get in there and do some pruning.  The raspberries are easy to identify as the canes are a bright brown and lack the large thorns of the roses.

Can you spot the raspberry canes among the roses?

But what to cut the canes with?  The reason they've probably taken hold there is it's impossible to get into the rose bushes without scratching ones body parts to pieces.  I need something with a long handle.  oh no, here we go again, another tool from that store that shalt not be named.  I seem to be obsessing about tools lately.

This handy thing is a raspberry cane cutter.  How perfect.  It has a telescoping handle for getting into hard to reach places and has a hooked blade on the end. (my apologies for the slightly fuzzy photo)

Just hook the blade around the cane and give it a good swift tug.

An hour later I had a pile of raspberry canes and a much nicer looking bunch of roses.  There's still plenty of work to be done pruning roses but that can be done in the spring.  I'm just happy I finally got around to this job as I've been putting it off for so long.  Who would have thought I'd be here at the end of November cleaning out rose bushes!  Just proves there's always something that can be done in the garden.

Oh the weather outside is frightful..

What to do when the weather isn't cooperating?  Well for me that means cleaning out the garage.  Nothing worse than itching to get to work in the spring and not being able to find your tools, so I'm taking this time now to tidy up and prepare myself.  After all you wouldn't want to find this when you opened up the garage in the spring.

To avoid that possibly unpleasant experience I took it upon myself recently to do some clean up.  Some of the work was completed earlier on.  I spent an afternoon in October washing out all my pots and stacking them neatly.  They'll come in handy for next spring's perennial sale when the neighbourhood starts planting up donations.  Then when the frosts began the hose was emptied of water and rolled up.    I've killed a few hoses in my lifetime, as well as pipes, so I knew better than to tempt fate.  In addition to moving the hose into the house the water tap was also turned off inside the house.

The garage obviously needed some tidying up to start with.  Empty manure bags went into the garbage, empty and non smelly mulch bags were saved for further use.  Seed propagation supplies were brought into the house for easy access as I will need them in early spring.   Garden accessories, like my crows were brought in to keep from rusting and disintegrating.

The potting bench was given a general tidying up.  Dirt was swept off, items were neatly piled.  Some nails were pounded into the wall so that more tools, that have been accumulated over the season, could be hung up.

Most importantly though my tools were cleaned.  I mean, of course I always clean my tools before I put them back!  um, who put this dirty old shovel back in the garage without cleaning it!?

Okay, so there are times when I'm not terribly organized or clean and things get thrown in and forgotten about.  This is the time to make up for it so I'm able to start fresh in the spring.  I pulled out my tools for the job.

The first item is a stiff brush.  This is actually meant to clean pots, which it is good for, but I also find it useful for scraping off hardened dirt from shovels.  Some tough bits require something harder to knock the clay loose but generally the brush does the job.  After a good brushing I give it a wipe with a cloth rag.  For many tools that's enough but every once in awhile I find some rust under all that dirt.  Putting away tools wet or with wet dirt clinging to them sometimes means they get a bit rusty.  To help clean them up I use my rust erasers.  Purchased at Lee Valley (yup, here we go again.  We should play a game of 'spot the Lee Valley tool') these small blocks have a rubbery texture but act like sandpaper.  They easily scrape away at spots on your tools and help with the job of clean up.

That shovel looks much better now.  (I realize the shovel is still pretty rusty but this an old second hand shovel and I'm not willing to scour the entire thing)  This was a handy exercise because many of my tools this year were inherited with the house purchase.  Cleaning them up made me take a close look and I discovered cracks in two shovels.  It also reminded me that my pruners needed sharpening and that the snow shovel needed to come up to the house.  Now I won't spend a lot of time next spring running around trying to find the tool for the job.  I can just dive right in and get to work.

My New Tool

It was my birthday a few months back and my dear mother-in-law gave me the best present.  A gift card to Lee Valley.  Lee Valley is a mail order and retail store that specializes in tools and accessories for woodworking, garden and hardware.  Everything from books and propagation supplies to shovels and fertilizer.  For me, looking through the Lee Valley catalogue is a little like a child being given the Christmas Wish catalogue.  I want one of everything.  So it took me some time to decide what I wanted for my birthday gift but I finally settled on the Compost Aerating Tool.

Normally I use a fork to turn my compost but it can be back breaking work and frankly doesn't do the best job.  The top layer tends to get turned over but the bottom never really gets touched.  The compost aerating tool looked like it might solve this problem.  It's basically a rod that you insert into the compost.  The tip of the rod is quite pointy so it's easy to insert.

When you pull the rod back out of the compost wings fold out and pull up the compost with it thus aerating the compost and mixing it up.

I had some reservations about ordering this tool as I was unsure how sturdy it would be.  The compost can get quite heavy and I worried this tool might bend or break or simply not be able to lift the mixture to my satisfaction.  Well, I'm pleased to report I was wrong.  When the tool came in the post I discovered it is made solely of steel and is coated so it won't rust.  It's exceptionally strong and sturdy and I was able to plunge it 4 feet deep into the compost without a worry.

The photo below shows the bin to be mixed.  You can see there are layers of apples, straw, sawdust and sod. These layers have settled quite a bit in the last month as well so there's quite a bit of weight there.

But within a few minutes it started to look like this.

So easy.  Just plunge the tool in and pull up.  I'm able to bring the compost right from the bottom of the pile and pull it to the top.  I'm smitten.

If there's an issue I have with this tool is that it's too strong.  Either that or I don't know my own strength.  My compost bin is lined with wire and I've found I have to be very careful not to plunge my new tool into this wire.  If you take a close look at the photo below you can see my mistake.

Serious oops.  I was attempting to get as close to the edge of the bin as possible but ended up plunging the aerator diagonally through the wire.  Because the wings fold out when you attempt to pull up I was unable to pull it back out the way it went in.  Wire cutters were necessary in the rescue attempt.

Despite the setback I'm still in love.  For $30 this thing has taken what used to be a pain in the arse kind of chore and turned it into a fun 15 minute job.  Exactly what a tool should do.  Make things easier.

The Plan, Part II

After putting together my list of To Do's this summer I somehow managed to overlook one very important item.  As I went out into the yard this past weekend ready to get down to business I realized - Where Are My Tools?!  If you'd like to dig a vegetable garden or weed a flower bed shovels, forks and weeders should be at your fingertips ready to do battle.  And so the following conversation ensued:

Jody, where's my garden fork, says I.

Outside, says he.

hmmmm.

Now outside is a very large place for a garden fork to be.  Is it in the shed?  The outhouse? (yes, we actually have an outhouse) The garage?  On the front porch?  In the driveway?  Laying in a flower bed?  It was later discovered leaning up against the back of the house.  This will never do says I. 

So the New Amended Garden Plan has now grown to include a section called - Create a Work Space.  Otherwise entitled Clean Out The Garage.  Our garage has become a dumping ground over the winter months for objects that didn't belong in the house and things we didn't want to be confronted with on a daily basis.  It has grown to look like this:

Somewhere in there are my gardening tools.  While cleaning out the garage isn't the most enticing chore all I really wanted to start with was my garden tools.  So step one was simply to organize a workspace.  Now I must confess that I'm a very lucky gal.  My husband is a woodworker and can be cajoled every so often into building items for my garden.  Several years ago he built me the most wondrous potting bench which houses all of my garden goodies.  We cleaned out a space, found the bench parts and put it together.

Once I had my bench up my hand tools practically flew out of the dark corners and placed themselves up on the bench for me.  Who wouldn't want to make themselves at home on that bench!  After that I pulled out all of the large handled tools.  Many were left behind by the former owner of the house so lots of organizing was needed.  I managed to pick up a tool rack second hand for this purpose and it worked wonders.  The Plano Molding 9123 Corner Tool Rack is similar to my own except that mine is not a corner unit.  Ironically I paid more for mine but that's okay because it works perfectly.  And finally my space is useable.

What a great feeling.  Now when I want to start a project I'll be able to quickly find the tools to do it.  And the first step of the great garage clean up has begun.