2013 Fall Home Improvement September 25, 2013
Special edition of LINCOLN DAILY NEWS.com
Page 9
by Jim Youngquist
WINTER
Getting your fruit trees and orchard ready for
apples and pears are just getting ready to pick when you should begin the mainte-
nance on your fruit trees and orchard. Peaches and plums finished in the first part
of August in this area. Those trees had fantastic production because of the rainfall
we had earlier this year.
THE
Healthy fruit trees have a natural
cycle of producing heavy fruit one
year and then light fruiting the
following year. Maybe it’s because
they wore themselves out and need
a rest. The best way to have good,
even production from year to year
is to prune your fruit trees each
fall. It has been shown that prun-
ing them back as much as one-
third causes the trees to have even,
heavy fruiting. That pruning allows
the tree to remain solid to support
its heavy fruit without breaking
limbs, and it helps the fruiting area
to remain within reach. Pruning
can begin anytime after the tree has
finished producing fruit.
Fall is a good time to carefully trim
the weeds from around the base
of the fruit tree and apply a new
plastic wrap to guard the trunk of
the tree, to prevent field mice and
larger vermin from making a nest
at the base and snacking on the
fruit tree’s succulent bark during
the winter.
For the same reason, clean up and
clear away any fallen fruit from
around the tree and orchard. Even
though the fallen fruit is not
appealing to you to eat, it is a treas-
ure to pests, vermin and rodents.
Raking up the fallen leaves from
around apple trees can help prevent
scale pests.
Fertilizer low in nitrogen can be
dropped or dug in around the drip
line of the fruit tree to facilitate
spring growth. Keep the amounts
low so that the fertilizers aid in
growth without burning off fine
roots.
Check the level of soil moisture. If
the soil is too dry, freezing can have
a greater effect on fruit trees. Soak-
ing the soil area around the base
out to the drip line can help the
fruit tree better survive a harsh
winter.
If the daily temperature has
dropped below 90 degrees, dormant
oil spray can be used to protect the
trees from insect pests. Prior to the
killing frost, many varieties of fruit
trees become infested with spider
mites, whitefly and scale insects.
Dormant oil spray is made of par-
affinic oil and does not contain any
poisons. The oil causes the insect
