Establishing tree height on young Pink Lady trees

29 May 2014 | Virginie Grégoire and Michael Crisera, Fruit Growers Victoria | Future Orchards® trial report

This trial at Lenne’s Orchards, Ardmona, compared ways to improve canopy development on second-leaf Rosy Glow trees on M9 rootstock. The block was planted in 2012 at approximately 1 m by 3.5 m and trained to a slender-style system.

Three treatments were compared: a control receiving the standard chemical thinning program, manual removal of flowers from the top 0.5 m of the tree in addition to chemical thinning, and complete fruit removal. The objective was to determine how reducing reproductive demand affected leader extension and canopy development in young trees.

APAL’s later synthesis reported that the two more aggressive crop-removal treatments produced the greatest leader extension and shoot length. The trial reinforces a core young-tree principle: early crop can compete strongly with vegetative growth. The appropriate balance will vary with rootstock, planting density, tree vigour and the grower’s target canopy, so crop removal should be linked to explicit establishment and production goals.