Pruning apple and pear trees: when, and how much to take

The most searched pruning question in the country, and the season is the part people get wrong.

Apples and pears are winter jobs

Established apple and pear trees are pruned when dormant, roughly November to early March, once the leaves are off. The structure is visible, the tree is not growing, and the cuts have time before the next season.

This is the opposite of stone fruit. Plums, cherries, apricots and gages are pruned in the growing season, usually late spring to summer, because pruning them in winter opens the door to silver leaf and bacterial canker. This is the single most common fruit tree mistake.

How much to take

The usual guidance is no more than about a quarter of the canopy in one winter. Cutting harder than that provokes the tree into producing vigorous vertical shoots, which carry no fruit, and you spend the following years correcting it. A neglected tree is better brought back over two or three winters than in one.

What to actually cut

Work through in order. Take out anything dead, damaged or diseased first. Then anything crossing or rubbing, because those wounds are where problems start. Then open the centre so light and air can reach the middle, which is what ripens fruit and keeps disease down. Aim for an open, goblet-like shape rather than a dense ball.

Cut back to a bud or a branch rather than leaving stubs, which die back.

Where the fruit comes from

Most apples and pears fruit on short stubby spurs that persist and produce for years, so removing all the small twiggy growth removes next year’s crop. Some varieties fruit at the tips of the previous year’s shoots instead and are pruned differently. If a tree has stopped fruiting after a hard prune, this is usually why.

Old and neglected trees

An old orchard tree that has not been touched for years is worth restoring rather than removing. It is a multi-year job: reduce height and spread gradually, thin the congested centre, and accept a poor crop for a season or two while it recovers. Very old fruit trees are also frequently the most valuable thing in a garden, and are sometimes protected.