Hello WWFRF friends! Last week Gary Moulton gave a 1 hour pruning course in the WSU auditorium. It was free and open to the public. Many of us garden veterans attended. We were already familiar with many thoughts about pruning but some concepts were nicely refreshed.
At the end Tom invited all attendees a chance to practice on our trees. And, we did get a couple new volunteers for Thursday morning.
The last 2 weeks we have been busy into pruning. Some concepts of pruning apply to all trees such as allowing light to penetrate or removing dead wood. In our fruit garden we only have a few identical trees. We enjoy a wonderful variety of fruit and cultivars. (It would be interesting to count just how many varieties of apples we have.) Since each tree is a little different each one requires its own plan of attack. Fortunately we have pruners willing to help any novices.
This tree pruning will continue for several more weeks. Soon we will begin blueberry pruning. Then we start thinning the tree fruit. Busy, busy, busy.
