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- Author or Editor: Charlotte M. Guimond x
To examine the effect of timing and severity of summer pruning on flower bud initiation and vegetative growth, 4-year-old `Bing' cherry trees (Prunus avium L.) were pruned at 31, 34, 37, 38, or 45 days after full bloom (DAFB) with heading cuts 20 cm from the base of current-season lateral shoot growth, or at 38 DAFB by heading current-season lateral shoot growth at 15, 20, 25, or 30 cm from the base of the shoot. The influence of heading cut position between nodes also was examined by cutting at a point (≈20 cm from the shoot base) just above or below a node, or in the middle of an internode. Summer pruning influenced the number of both flower buds and lateral shoots subsequently formed on the shoots. All of the timings and pruning lengths significantly increased the number of both flower buds and lateral shoots, but differences between pruning times were not significant. There was significantly less regrowth when shoots were pruned just below a node or in the center of an internode, rather than just above a node, suggesting that the length of the remaining stub may inhibit regrowth somewhat. The coefficient of determination (r 2) between flower bud number and regrowth ranged from -0.34 to -0.45. In young high-density sweet cherry plantings, summer pruning may be useful for increasing flower bud formation on current-season shoots. The time of pruning, length of the shoots after pruning, and location of the pruning cut can influence subsequent flower bud formation and vegetative regrowth.
Young sweet cherry (Prunus avium) trees are typically upright, vegetatively vigorous, and nonprecocious, taking 5 to 6 years to come into production. To produce fruit in high-density orchards by year 3 or 4, development of lateral shoots for potential fruiting is critical in year 2 or 3. An experiment was designed to promote lateral branching on 2-year-old trees. The experiment was conducted in a commercial orchard in Roosevelt, Wash., with `Bing' and `Van' on the vigorous rootstocks Mazzard and Colt. The trees were planted at 415 trees per acre with three scaffolds trained into a “V” canopy design. The experimental variables were treatments with and without Promalin (1.8% BAP plus 1.8% GA4+7), applied at a ratio of 1:3 in latex paint at green tip stage; superimposed on these treatments were either heading cuts of each scaffold to 2 m long (or tipping the scaffold if it was <2 m), removing four to five buds subtending the terminal bud, a combination of heading and bud removal, or controls. On trees that were not treated with Promalin, three additional treatments included either removing subtending buds at budbreak, or removing buds at multiple locations along the scaffold at green tip or at budbreak. New lateral shoots were counted 4 weeks after budbreak, and the quality of the shoots (shoot diameter and angle of emergence) was measured at the time of summer pruning. Interactions between Promalin, bud manipulation, and pruning will be discussed in relation to development of canopy structure.
Flower initiation and development in `Bing' sweet cherry (Prunus avium L.) was examined using scanning electron microscopy. There was a 1- to 2-week difference in the time of initiation of flower buds on summer pruned current season shoots (P) compared to buds borne on unpruned shoots (U) or spurs (S). By late July, this difference was obvious in morphological development. The P buds had already formed floral primordia, while the S and U buds showed little differentiation in the meristem until early August. In general, buds from unpruned shoots were similar developmentally to spur buds. By late August, primordial differentiation was similar in the buds from all the wood types; however, buds from pruned shoots were significantly larger (838 μm) than buds from spurs (535 μm) and unpruned shoots (663 μm). Early summer pruning may shift allocation of resources from terminal shoot elongation to reproductive meristem development at the base of current season shoots. The similarity in reproductive bud development between spurs and unpruned shoots, given the difference in active terminal growth, might suggest that developmental resources are inherently more limiting in reproductive buds on spurs.