With the unusually warm weather this winter, gardeners don’t have to wait until spring to begin pruning their fruit trees since the plants are dormant and the sap is not moving. Do you grow fruit trees? If so, winter is the traditional time to prune them. Most people wait until spring to begin their pruning, but with the warmer weather we have had, you can get this chore done early. In fact, any time the tree is dormant and the sap is not moving, you can prune fruit trees and shrubs. You can even prune rhododendrons, but most gardeners wait until after the shrubs have flowered before pruning.

Apples, plums, peaches and pears

Take your hand and hold it, fingers up, as if you are about to catch a ball. That’s the ideal shape for a fruit tree. By keeping the middle open and the outer sides growing, you create a vase-shaped tree that allows sunlight to get to every part of the tree.

BY ROGER MARSHALL Ideally, you start training your trees to this shape when they are young and keep pruning to achieve this shape as the tree grows. Unfortunately, many of us have older trees that aren’t quite that shape and need more work.

First, understand that you should never prune more than 20 to 25 percent of the tree away each year. With that said, first prune out the suckers or water sprouts. Those are the upright twiggy branches that grow from an old wound or up the middle of the tree. If you get rid of them, the tree will begin to look more open.

Next decide on the shape you want your tree to take. You may have to cut away a few larger branches to get it to fit that shape. If you cut off larger branches make sure you cut the branches close to the joint or tree trunk. This way the tree bark can grow over the wound that you have created, rather like a scab that forms over a scrape on your knee.

Now go around the tree and prune away all the growing shoots from last season. Prune so you leave one or two outward-facing buds just below the cut. These outward-facing buds will become new branches and by making them outward facing the tree will spread wider and keep the middle open.

If your tree is heavily overgrown, prune out about 25 percent of it this year and 25 percent each of the next three years to bring it back into shape. If you prune more than that you stand a good chance of forcing your tree into abnormal growth and weakening it. Plus, you won’t get any fruit.

Once you have pruned your tree, spray it with dormant oil to kill off insect eggs lodged in the bark and on branches. You can spray any day that the temperatures rise above 50 degrees with no possibility of rain within 48 hours. The next spraying should be with a copper fungicide about five to six weeks later to control bacteria and fungal diseases.

Raspberries

When pruning raspberries, take out the old grey or silver wood. Just snip it off at the bottom of the cane. These are the canes that bore fruit last year and will not bear again. The fresh brown shoots are the ones that will bear fruit this year. I like to snip off these canes about 3 feet high. The cane will then sprout a half dozen or so smaller shoots at the top of the cane and produce raspberries on each of these shoots. You get a greater yield of slightly smaller fruit.

Black currants

Black currants carry their fruit on the canes produced last season, thus older brittle canes should be pruned away. In fact, some authorities suggest pruning out the entire cane as you pick the black currants. To my mind, this is a drastic measure but one that is much simpler because you can easily figure out which canes are producing fruit. As soon as the growing season starts, side-dress the shrubs with well-rotted manure or compost.

Blackberries

Like black currants, blackberries produce fruit only on canes that developed last year. Older canes should be pruned away, simply to stop the thorns from grabbing at you, if nothing else. Pruning out old canes also helps to let more sunlight into the blackberry patch.

Gooseberries and red and white currants

Remove all the old, dark brown or black wood of canes that have fruited and cut the growing tips back about 25 to 30 percent to an outward-facing bud. Like black currants, as soon as the growing season starts, side-dress the plants with well-rotted manure or compost.

There are other ways to prune such trees, but they require far more intensive methods of training, and much more attention from the gardener. For the basic home garden fruit, production is paramount and the methods outlined above will work for most fruit trees.