Expert Gardening Secrets To Keep Fruit Trees Small! Pruning Tips and Tricks for Small Space Gardens
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- čas přidán 29. 06. 2024
- Did you know that a tree's "maximum height" isn't set in stone? YOU can control the height of trees with these tips for growing fruit trees in a small backyard space.
Resources:
Grocery Row Gardening: amzn.to/34kTM98
Grow a Little Fruit Tree: amzn.to/3My3ma7
Pruning and Training: amzn.to/3hOu4gy
Subscribe to the newsletter: thesurvivalgardener.us3.list-...
David's Gardening Books: amzn.to/2pVbyro
Compost Your Enemies t-shirts: www.aardvarktees.com/products...
David's gardening blog: www.thesurvivalgardener.com
In today's video, David The Good covers different methods for pruning fruit trees and keeping trees small. Topics include coppicing, pollarding, espalier, training trees to a wire, backyard orchard culture, festooning, planting multiple trees in a single hole and more. In the Grocery Row Gardens, it's important to keep fruit trees little, as otherwise they'll shade the vegetables. When you prune and train fruit trees, you keep tree root systems under control as well.
We pushed the zone by espaliering a key lime tree against our south-facing wall. Protecting a tree from frost with this method allowed us to get key limes without fail. Training trees to a fan shape or training peaches to a vase shape allows you different outcomes as compared to letting a tree grow to its full height. You can grow LOTS of fruit trees in a small backyard if you don't let them get big. - Jak na to + styl
Did you know that a tree's "maximum height" isn't set in stone? YOU can control the height of trees with these tips for growing fruit trees in a small backyard space.
Resources:
Grocery Row Gardening: amzn.to/34kTM98
Grow a Little Fruit Tree: amzn.to/3My3ma7
Pruning and Training: amzn.to/3hOu4gy
Subscribe to the newsletter - I try to send out about one a week with gardening inspiration and news: thesurvivalgardener.us3.list-manage.com/subscribe/post?u=d1c57e318ab24156698c41249&id=1f74a21dc8
Thank you all for watching!
Im tying all my leggy key lime shoots in circular loops
Does this include all nut bearing trees?
Thanks David! Great video, very informative. :)
yes sir... trees and plants growth is also not determined by age but by nutrition
Fantastic video, I work for the co-op food forest Abundance and this super useful info
Great intro to this subject. The best thing you have ever done for me (both through books and video) is to make me a brave gorilla gardener. My favorite David the Good sayings:
Just throw it on the ground.
When in doubt, chop it off.
It's just seeds, they're cheap.
I don't like it, you're outta here.
What is it? I don't know, compost it.
Is it dead? Bury it.
Is it weak? Cull it.
I don't coddle wimpy plants.
Eat what's in season, you won't die.
Child labor is a good thing.
Thank God for the harvest, even if it looks weird.
🤣
Fear not and prune on!
Yes! 🥳🥰
Isn’t “compost your enemies “ one of David sayings too? 😆
I keep hearing David The Good's voice in my head saying, "Who cares?!?" It has unfrozen my analysis paralysis so many times!
I just remembered -- I've seen trees that were deliberately bent long ago by Indians for various purposes (some were trail markers, others may have been bent to make handles or parts for various tools they used). That could be a fun project. Like, bend a tree to make the rockers for a rocking chair. My great-grandfather built a rocking chair that way -- with naturally-bent wood -- for my great-grandmother, and all the babies in the family got rocked in that chair at least once, down to my oldest daughter (I had to sneak a sit-down with her at the museum where it's now part of a local history exhibit). Great-grandad found a section of wood with the bend he wanted, and split it to get identical rockers. Not fruit, but something that could be interesting to play with.
Several years ago, a beam broke at Buckingham Palace. At the time the palace was built, a tree was planted and trained to be the replacement for that exact bent beam. Once upon a time, tree bending was a common and valuable art that created beams much stronger than can be made with straight grained wood.
Yeah there are a few buisnesses which make grown furniture. I would love to give it a try when I have some land to try it out on ..
Indians used to bend them to point in the direction of a water source.
@@looksirdroids9134 I'm not sure where you got the idea that "Indians" is a derogatory term - maybe from TV? I have a half-Indian sister-in-law, and a full Indian foster-cousin, and I assure you, they don't consider it derogatory at all. That's a left-wing woke idea, trying to create division and strife.
I watched a documentary that said in China they would bend branches to make chariot parts that were stronger and lighter than if they were made from two straight pieces of wood.
Thank you, I needed this! We bought a property with an overgrown orchard that's got all manner of funk going on in it. Did some maniacal pruning last week before the buds open. I've been so scared of making mistakes, but between you and Ann Ralph my inner psychopathic arborist has been awakened. Thank you!
I don't know if they are still doing anything with it, but at one time the Alaska Ag Extension Experiment stations were trying out various fruit trees and found that they could bend them to grow horizontally very low, which made it easier to protect them in the winter. I think they may have gotten the idea from some work being done in Siberia. It would work not only for winter protection, but also to make it easier to protect trees from pests, and from high winds.
I use to do what I call live tree art. I made a chair in one tree by bending branches, another one I made a big circle by bending branches. It made me feel real good after doing it. This is what you reminded me of when watching this.
That is wonderful.
The best camera person EVER. Scrabble with David ,I think not.
My husband was watching this over my shoulder and asked who’s that? I said “That’s David the Good and he prunes like a psychopath” And next winter I will be too! I’m sick of trying to harvest fruit from a 20 foot tall mulberry and the figs are insane. I have paw paws, persimmons and plums from Stark Bros on the way. They need some some apical dominance action for sure hehe!
Hey! It's been a year since you made this post.. did you do the crazy prune? And if so, how'd it go? :)
I wish more people in the gardening community would think this way.
Truly grateful for all your wonderful knowledge.
Backyard orchard culture. Keep trees small.
This is great video. We're on the Canadian prairies, and here we basically need to use full sized rootstocks for fruit trees like apples just to have the vigor and cold hardiness, also the growing season in short. Yes I do have an old apple tree that's 35 feet tall, but only because it wasn't pruned - sure they can get that large. All of the standard "full sized" trees I've planted in years since have been really easy to keep small with pruning and training, selecting some main scaffolds and keeping them low and spreading, and the trees can be close together. My orchard was planted in a forest, the natural vegetation before I started was all aspen (tall but they don't produce much shade), choke cherry, saskatoon, and small oaks. Instead of clear cutting the trees to make room, I just made paths around them, and used small existing clearings to plant my fruit trees. Instead of removing small oaks I decided to make them into Niwaki, or garden trees. Yes the oaks can be 50' tall, but I'm going to keep them at 5-6' with pruning, and give them cool artistic shapes. Same with pines, I've added them around the orchard and train the with cool bends, Niwaki is like an in ground larger bansai. The few tall aspens that might eventually block some light will be reduced like "syntropic agroforestry" style, I can keep the tree and just remove branches, pollard it down to size and add their biomass to the ground - ok we don't have bamboo or bananas here to chop and drop but it's the same idea. Most of the light in the summer is at a high angle, so dense spacing is fine and the trees can still get full sun even though they've been integrated into a forest garden. I enjoy all of your ideas about keeping the trees the shape and size you want. One day I can imagine step over espaliers around my garden paths. There's another style of training we're trying here in zone 3 called Russian artic stanza, where you train an apple tree along the ground so it can be covered up by snow for the winter and zone push.
Excellent. You know what you're doing!
This naturally happened to my peach tree accidentally grown from compost. I decided to pot it up, then plant in permanently once it was a year old. The thing set heavy fruit 3rd year. It bent all the branches down and the thing is absolutely beautiful.
Luna moth... BEAUTIFUL. I got lucky enough to have one visit me here in a zone 4 north of Ottawa, Canada. about 3 years ago.
For the tree training technique, the native Americans would use a similar method to make trail trees as markers for travelling
Thanks for sharing
Yes, this video is inspiring! I have a young orchard and want to keep the trees down to an easy to harvest height. Going for it!!
Brilliant information. I was listening to every word. Yes, trees do want to grow for us. It's not a coincidence that they breathe what we exhale, and we breathe what they exhale.
Bravo 👏 Thank you, Sir. 😊
Fantastic humor on the topic. Same expression I make when friends and family say I can't have so many fruit trees in my yard lol. I can do whatever I want. I own the tree 🥰
Thank you for making this. After watching the video I went outside and spent the rest of the day pruning my fruit trees.
I followed you advice on pruning a peach tree way down last year. I am so amazed at the massive amount of blossoms it produced this year. Love you videos!
Thank you, Sarah. Good work.
I just ordered 5 Dwarf Everbearing Mulberry trees from Florida and 4 Celeste Fig. The Mulberry trees are tiny but arrived in February with leaves. I put them under a 12w panel light on a tabletop garden with a failed pump timer in a strawberry planter in fresh potting soil until planting time. I planted a Brown Turkey Fig before the nightmare drought and 100+ heatwave in Louisiana last year. I have 4 cuttings from it to plant too and I`m trying 2 Pineapple Guava. On line of 8b/9a but we get single digit temps every year now sadly. By next winter I`ll have coverings and warming lights to keep my fig trees from freezing. I saved my fig tree this year by covering it in leaves and pine straw and a plastic barrel wrapped in a thermal blanket. We had such a cold spring last year that nothing normal grew...then we had decent weather for a few weeks before the heatwave.
I bought Grow a Little Fruit tree and it really gave me a great eduation on how to keep your trees small and full of fruit. Now I try to spread the word. Exciting stuff!
The art of bonsai would be an amazing starting place to learn what a tree need an how and what one is actually able to do with any tree. I’m not telling anyone to go and make bonsais but rather study the art of it to use this incredible knowledge in the garden.
To keeps bonsai alive for many generations it means you have grasped the full science, not only but to pass on the information to your children as to continue growing the tree that grate grate grate grandfather started !
I agree.
Thanks for sharing your tree tips 🤩 I've been training my trees to stay small for a couple years now and appreciate your insights!
I literally was wondering about our tamarind trees and you inspired me on how to prune. Crazy WPB FL 💯👍🇺🇸
I love your grocery row gardening book! I love how short and to the point it was, plenty of info to explain it but I could finish the book and get out gardening in a few days with a baby on my lap
2:19 I had to pause. 🤣😂🤣 I was laughing so hard my side hurt, my eyes were full of tears, and I might have wet myself. This is every single day in the garden. First the para cord not working, then Fetching and finding all the little things one needs, back and forth… too much. 😂🤣😂 You are a master at the art of subtle humor.
I NEEDED this video. I have tufts of plum trees cropping up every where in my yard. Which already has a grove of 3 huge clusters. I didn't want to but I was about to rip up all of them that were outside the "box" that I want them to grow in. You don't know how many trees you just saved! 15 in the conservative side. You also saved me from some regret because they are all between 3 and 5 years old. Now I'm looking forward to trimming them and keeping them along side my veggies. Thank you!
Awesome!!!
Thanks for giving us courage to trim to maintain heights.
Love it!
Our plum tree we had for 8 yrs before it gave us fruit. We actually thought it was a cherry until we got fruit last year..we were so excited!😄
Good timing with this video David. I have several volunteer peach trees I need to transplant. Knowing I can keep them small enables us to choose other places in the yard other than the middle where other fruit producing trees and bushes are. Thanks for the information!
I have gotten a lot of volunteer peach trees the last few years. I have been interested in how they do long term.
Wish I had learned this a year ago with my small space.. but I have learned it now so here we go! Thank you!
You are awesome.
You remind me of my now-passed gardening friend who I could talk about gardening for hours. Others would not understand this passion. You are like that.
Unlike you, I love ornamentals. My passion is in design and how the plant material and hardscape create a picture that is ever-changing.
I'm glad I found you. Your passion is a food-source.
I missed most of it live but the end was halarious! Watching the replay now.
I have an everbearing Key Lime tree I requested when someone asked me “what do you want for your (60th) birthday?” and it was attacked by aphids which I got rid of after battling the ants farming them then the aphids only to have leaf miners full on attack it ! It bloomed twice so heavy it looked like all the branches were snow covered and set almost no fruit. It did very well at keeping blooms and every size of fruit up to mature size simultaneously until these pests found it. It is in a big pot. I give it a little citrus fertilizer (6-4-6) once a month as nursery instructed.
I started an Espalier project last year! Loving it!
Yes! I did find this truly inspiring and just a whole lot of fun to listen to. great job !
Perfect timing, for me growing in Zone 5/6 anyway!!! :) Can't thank you enough, I am super excited for this year's growing season! From trying the grocery row farming to pruning my new fruit trees, I am just so motivated and have renewed confidence, thank you so much!!!
I am very glad to hear it.
Wow! This is exactly what I need. Thanks so very much 🥰
Excellent video sir! Thanks for the info. Can't get enough of this kind of experimenting. Also, great use of old garden hose, love it! Outtakes are hilarious.
That ending was perfection! ❤️
So good! I am definitely using some of these ideas!
And I'm so glad I watched to the end 😂
Incredibly helpful!! You’re a fantastic mind reader too because we were just talking about getting another apple tree and a peach tree!
But I’m order for our new apple tree to pollinate our old ones- it needs to go in the front yard, and that’s really limited space!
So this is great! Just found your channel a few weeks ago, subbed almost immediately. You give good advice, you make me laugh and your baby is precious as the Summer days are long!
Welcome - thank you.
Oh man this gives me some wild ideas.. I love walking around in heavily wooded areas around my house and ever since I was a little kid I've seen trees while walking or hunting that grow in the wildest ways and I try to imagine how that wild growth came to be maybe it was trampled as a sapling, or rubbing caused an odd bend, or perhaps it would bend to get the best light.. After watching this video it totally confirmed for me that essentially any tree can be manipulated like the bonsai trees that became so popular when Karate Kid came out. So many ideas!
Thank you so much for this awesome content! Options are endless, so exciting 🥳
wow. I have mulberry trees that are in my back yard courtesy of birds and I think I might try cutting one down and growing the branches along the fence. I would be able to harvest them easier! Best idea ever!
Another great show! I have planted 6 apple trees and 3 pear trees. When I got them i cut them back, and again in the fall to strengthen the root system. I now this year have found I have a ceder rust problem, since ceder trees are near by. I did plant rust resistant trees.They are semi dwarf size. I have come to the same thought of making them dwarf and will do that since I will have to spray them for this problem.And do not want to be spraying up into the clouds. And it will make it easier to harvest the fruit some day. I like the way you think out of the box.
We watched your video when you cut the trees in half. It's funny how life works, that lead down a path that led to use doing the same thing with our 1st two apple trees a couple of weeks ago. And bonus was it horrified our family !! We also found Dave Wilson through you. Ah Dave Wilson, we love those Jean shorts and videos in horrendous winds. An awesome channel!! Thanks, David. You're a Goodman, 1/2 crazy but good ;)
Morale of the story : trees are spaceships, got it
Cheers from Victoria, Canada
So much interesting that you can actually grow fruit trees and such in very very limited spaces or even crowding them to grow a bunch of them at once.
You are such an inspiration to try new things..very encouraging! Blessings to you! 🌻🤗
One more thing, which doesn't have a lot to do with pruning fruit trees, but recently you mentioned in passing that you wanted to experiment with keeping nut trees small. I don't know about other nuts (hazelnuts should work), but was just reminded that chestnuts are commonly used in coppiced woodlands in Europe. So pruning them to keep them small would probably work quite well. (I was looking up coppicing information because I have a patch of young black locusts that I'm going to coppice for tool handles, garden stakes, and a little bit of firewood.)
Extremely inspiring! Thanks for sharing some knowledge from your vast experience! Love this kind of video. Thanks for the book recommendations as well. Super funny outtakes🤣🤣
"...Where's the loop?..." We love you Dave. ;-)
Thank you,Thank you,Thank you!!! Lots and lots of lovely knowledge and inspiration!!! Great!!🌱👍😃
We just got our first successful propagation of our mulberries. Also experimenting with airlayering at loquat at my wife work in the back there's a giant tree with delicious fruits
Nice video. Coppicing works because you use the already extensively developed roots. The tree has tremendous power when coming out of dormancy, completely focussed to new growth. It can absorb tremendous amount of nutrients.
Been watching and loving your vids for a while now and finally bought your Grocery Row Gardening book just now :D Love your work bro, greetings from Aotearoa, New Zealand.
This video is amazing! just what I needed to hear! Thanks!
I have a small 3 year old apple tree I started from seed and a buck deer rubbed it and killed it, or so I thought. I cut it off to almost the ground and it has grown back from this short trunk with several branches. So I’m going to train the branches to grow sideways after watching this video :) I like to experiment too in my garden. Excited to try this.
Those two books have been on my to-buy list for over a year now. Didn't expect to see them here. Maybe I should just get them over the weekend. Thanks for the recommendation!
Thanks for the invaluable information and the bloopers!
I discovered your channel fairly recently, and I have loved everything I've seen thus far, but my heart leapt when I heard you say "I don't care about ornamentals". And your wife -"People don't know what it's like to play scrabble with you." Duuude. 😁
Party on Garth!!!
Seriously, 1000% better than any of the dreck on television, genuinely entertaining while we learn excellent practical, useful things, and get to go online and do what Phillipians 4:8 tells us. Just love this so much!
Thank you - that is really kind of you. Welcome.
Excellent information, David. I have five bare root fruit trees that I plan to keep small within a 10x10 mini-orchard. The trees are currently in pots until I see if they are all still alive. I plan to get them into the ground next fall and will be lopping them off as soon as I plant them. The idea makes me nervous, I'll admit, but I'm hopeful that they will all survive my tender loving care.
You can do it.
I'm getting brave . We have two pear trees that only have two or three pears WAY up in the top that I can't reach. I'm going to cut them . They are no good the way they are so if they die I will not have lost anything. Thank you for the information. Love your book and videos.
I have been trying to grow plums in my area for nearly 3 years. They kept dying and someone told me to plant them in mounds of dirt bc my water table is so high that the roots were rotting. Plus I have alot of red clay. So far they are doing good. I planted 3 like this last summer.
Good luck.
Sounds like drainage. Try using a fine chipped fir bark mix 50/50 with native clay as back fill. Even if you have a higher water table this will allow for drainage of the top layer of roots and prevent systemic rot.
Another tip with clay soil is not water too frequently. Clay is not as porous so it's imperative to saturate the soil completely. Leave the drip on once -2x per week in fall and spring for 45 minutes. Wait at least 4-5 days between waterings. In summer, 1x per week at one hour interval every 5 days
Watering multiple days in a row for only a few minutes will keep the top layer of roots wet and the bottom dry out. As the bottom dies, the bacteria travel to the rest of the root system.
Best part is the end. Love this guy 😂
Thanks for this awesome video man ! Very useful!
Okay, You caught me at the point you were having difficulty cutting the rope. Lordy I do the same think trying anything to keep from stopping and getting correct tool! Lol too funny and thanks for the growing tips.
Your concern for saving our trauma is a real comfort stay great
At Mount Vernon...Washington's home....all the fruit trees are espalared on a low garden stone wall. Truely beautiful!
Another great video and a few more books, lol. I've grafted successfully, so maybe pruning is the next parallel.
David you're so weirdly funny, lol🎯
Love the bloopers at the end, guys! Thanks again.
"If we de-apicalize its dominance..."
I love it.
Thank you. You made me laugh, too.
A little besides the point, but we had to prune our Sour Orange tree, that thing was getting so tall, thick & bushy, plus it was nearby the neighbors, so we wouldn't want it growing over their fence. Pulled out some large stalks from the inside and made a cool walking stick with it. The wood was even soft enough to cut designs into it, made for a fun little project. Now our Sour Orange is more manageable, and even has a few flower buds on it. Hopefully gonna fruit a lot better this year.
That is really cool.
This is large bonsai in the ground basically. Awesome!
"Stop laughing! This is real!"😂😂😂
Hahaha love the blooper reel.
Excellent video, well done.
I espaliered a nectarine tree, never looked back, great idea. Better fruit over slightly smaller yield. :-)
Just the video I need, David the good! Ty !
Exactly what I was looking for
Somewhat related; I came across how the Russians began growing citrus between 1920 and 1940. They grew their citrus in trenches 2-6ft deep and of course the entire tree would have to fit into that because once winter hit they would have to cover the trenches with wood to protect the trees from cold and snow. Keep the trees small and create a nice micro-climate for them to thrive.
Love this guy!
Thanks, David.
You camera person does such a great job. I can tell they know how to use the rule of thirds when framing the shot. Great video y'all!
Thank you. She is good.
Very interesting gardening information.
Wow 🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉
Ah David! You and Stefan S. (in neighbouring Quebeckistan) are two of my favourite educators! Now, if we could only get Stefan to SING! ha ha ha
I've been waiting for this particular kind of video. I have over 30 fruit trees and plan to put them in the ground this fall. I want to keep them short and taunt. So thanks. I'm just afraid of cutting off the wrong branches when they start touching.
Awesome little boat!!great advice@!
13:55 I’ve inherited a small permaculture Forrest with my property, I swear I’ve learned more about it from your videos than I ever expected! We have lots of trees cut head high, I suspected it was for fire wood, because we have a fireplace, but we also have a lot that are simple tall dead stumps maybe 12 ft high , I figured they were left for birds or owls 🦉 to forge or nest in?
Yes
Try growing mushrooms around the base of your dead trees
When I first planted an apricot tree, a horse munched it down to 4 feet. Well, it did well the following years and I cut it back by a third each year. It'll grow back, yes.
So good
I use old trampoline springs and chains to weigh down branches for horizontal growth. Springs and coathangers are my mainstays for tree growth training. I don't have a tree in my mini yard that I haven't controlled the growth of.
I would love to see photos - would you email me some? david@floridafoodforests.com
Just discovered your books and videos, love them! I have a question about some peach and nectarine trees I planted a few years ago. I had read the books you suggested years ago and the Dave Wilson stuff and I did start off really well keeping everything small, started them off at knee height, etc, but the past year or two, I didn't keep on top of the pruning and my four trees are 10-12 ft tall! They are planted close to each other, and I figured I'd wait until after fruiting because they were loaded with blossoms this year, but will it harm the trees to really lop off big thick branches or should I do more minimal pruning of the thinner branches now and when it goes dormant again next winter, then do the more severe pruning to get them back in shape and reduce their size? Thank you!
Inspiring! Thanks for the book referrals.
Thank you for yet another great video.
Thank you.
I live in zone 5 Quebec, my greenhouse have 6 foots high
I put a peach tree in it I cut the tall branches and let the other branches grow and tie it on each side
I love it
That is awesome. Would you email pictures to me? david@floridafoodforests.com
Great content 👍 Thanks good health and God bless 👍
Very interesting thank you
Thank you so much for your great content!
Thank you.
And now we know not to play scrabble with you. Thanks for the head's up, Rachel.
Cool👍👍👍
Well you just gave me some ideas on how to prune my Peach trees from seed of course one of them is only waist high but it's has tons of branches thanks for the video David