Pruning the Apple Trees

With over 100 mostly young apple trees my pruning chores aren't too over powering yet.  Here are some before and after pics of a Williams Pride apple tree. I grafted the scion to a "volunteer" apple tree in 2014 and hope to get some apples from it this year.

 

This pic shows the graft union.  I had cut the tree off at about chest height and used a "bark graft" to graft two pieces of scion to the trunk.

 

 

 

It was a dreary rainy morning and the pic didn't turn out very well, but you can see some of the unruly growth against the sky.

 

 

After pruning many of the limbs more air and light can get to the center of the tree promoting better health and hopefully some nice apples to enjoy this fall.

 

Although it takes time and work I enjoy pruning apples trees.  Choosing which limbs to cut and which ones to let grow you shape the tree into the form you want it to grow into.