How to do the taper cut

Thinning out old fruit trees - work steps

First, thin out the crown vigorously, going from top to bottom. Remove

• all branches that are too close together directly at the point of attachment
• weak or cancerous branches
• Branches that are too close to others

In addition, old fruit trees often have a dense tangle of shoots on the outer parts. Old branches covered with a lot of whorls are replaced by young shoots. These have mostly formed on the tops of the branches. If the crown is too high and can only be reached with difficulty, place it on lower branches. All these pruning work can be carried out as early as November, right after the leaves have fallen. After pruning, the crown should have a blunt, pyramidal shape - similar to a house gable.

Do not cut back severely neglected crowns at once

However, it is best not to prune old trees so severely all at once: Otherwise, strong new shoots can develop on the remaining branches, the so-called water shoots. So it is better to cut the trees in two to three consecutive weeks and thus prevent the strong development of these disruptive shoots.

Rejuvenate the fruit tree - further steps

In the case of severe baldness, it is of course not enough just to thin out the crown. In addition, you still need to do this work:

• First align the crown as described.
• Now take back all the strong branches by one to three meters.
• Take the leading branches back to lower side branches.
• Always start from the weakest guide branch.
• Now cut all the side wood back to 50 centimeters.

After the cut, the tree should be heavily fertilized will.

Cutting measures in the following years

Hopefully the pruned tree will sprout heavily in the next few years. Now you have to thin out regularly and remove new shoots that are too close together - water shoots should not be used until spring or in summer removed.