20 April 2020
The beginning of Spring found us pruning our olive trees. It's a significant process that helps the trees grow and fruit, and guarantees a thorough air circulation and optimum sunlight. These are necessary not only for boosting the tree's production but most importantly to protect it from all sorts of diseases. A proper crown shaping facilitates all farming operations, such as harvesting, spraying or fertilizing, providing the producer with far greater flexibility in her farm.
What to consider when Pruning your Olive Tree
In pruning for fruiting, as this type of pruning is called (since its aim is to induce branches that will bear fruit by exposing them to light and maintaining a vigorous and active fruiting zone), we remove:
- diseased branches
- dead branches that will not bear fruit anymore
- any branch that does not allow proper air circulation and sun light penetration in the tree
- inward growing limbs that will not be used as substitutes in the future
- exhausted branches that have borne fruit for more than 4 consecutive seasons
Bear in mind not to change the shape of the tree’s canopy and to not remove more than 15% of its total foliage.
Lastly, try to remember that we trim olive trees that grow in irrigated soils much lighter than we prune respective ones that grow in dry and barren soils.
