Small Fruit Trees

Growing lots of fresh fruit has always been a goal of ours. However, if you have a large fruit tree, then you know its hard to keep up with the harvest. Also, if the tree is big, then you’re more than likely going to have to use a ladder to get the fruit at the top. That doesn’t vibe with us.

We don’t want to get on ladders and we don’t want harvests we don’t know what to do with. Instead, keeping fruit trees small means they’re safe to harvest (no ladders) and the harvests are more manageable. The key to keeping fruit trees small is the summer prune. Every summer, we control tree size by topping and shaping the trees. Pruning during summer decreases the vigor of the tree, resulting in less vegetative growth and better fruit quality. Smaller fruit trees also means we can plant more trees in less space. We’ve been able to fit fruit trees in as tight as 3-foot spacing and still get great yields from healthy trees. Planting more trees in smaller spaces means you’ll harvest more varieties over the course of the year rather than once from one large tree.