I am one of those who gets excited to see the first indications of spring. I delight in discovering signs of life peeking through the dark, cold earth or breaking out of seemingly lifeless twigs and branches. Tiny miracles are happening all around as the days begin to lengthen and the sun warms the frost from the ground. If you’re like me, you can’t wait to see the lush, green, new growth and colorful flowers bursting into bloom. Believe me when I say, “It’ll happen before you know it!” In fact, if you’re not careful, you may miss some important preparations that will effect the way your landscape responds the rest of the year. Here are some of the things that will set the stage for great and productive gardening this coming year.

The first of these topics is preparing your fruit trees for optimum production. A lot of people feel that they have to have fruit bearing trees or shrubs, however; many don’t have the time nor patience to care for them. Most fruit bearing plants require quite a bit of maintenance to produce the kind of crop we hope for and we are approaching one of the most critical times to perform some of that maintenance.

Prune your fruit trees any time during their dormancy. In other words, if you haven’t pruned your fruit trees yet, now is the time to do it.
There are a few tricks to remember while pruning your trees . . . First, don’t cut off a branch flush with the branch or trunk it’s attached to. Cut the branch off square at a 90-degree angle with the direction of the branch, leaving a fraction of an inch above the crotch. There is some tissue differentiation in the tree right where the branch begins and if you cut into it you could cause tissue to become diseased or even die.

Second, it’s usually better not to treat each new wound with a pruning compound or sealer, because the tree won’t bleed to death if you’ve cut off the limb properly. Many times applications of sealers can promote disease and insect infestations.

Third, in general, all trees will grow and look healthier if all the branches growing toward the center of the tree are pruned out. It is also a good practice to prune out suckers and water sprouts from any of your fruit trees. These branches tend to grow faster and are smoother with more space between leaf buds (nodes) than the other branches. They also grow straight up.

Each fruit tree likes to be pruned a little differently. Cherries and pears don’t usually need much pruning. Apples generally bear their fruit on spurs so, when pruning, make sure there are enough spurs on the branches you leave to ensure a good crop. Apricots, nectarines, peaches, plums and prunes ripen better if there is a good amount of light penetrating into the tree. Thinning out unnecessary branches inside the tree’s canopy will open it up and allow more light to penetrate into it. Except for apricot trees, the others just mentioned should be pruned to a vase shape to maximize light penetration.

Don’t forget to use Dormant Spray! Start checking your trees to see if it’s time to spray unseen critters and their eggs overwintering there. Many problems can be prevented by applying this control as the tree is breaking dormancy. Though assigning a date or time for this application would be easier, to make this work, you have to watch the tree’s development. The time will vary, depending on weather conditions, every spring. The time is right when the buds begin to break and color can be seen between the brown scales of the bud. Some trees bloom before the leaves begin to grow and the others produce leaves first, so look for a bit of white, pink, green, etc. and then hurry and get it sprayed! Mixing an insecticide with the Dormant Spray can enhance control of pests even before they become a problem.

We gardeners are “antsy” to welcome spring and any excuse to get into the garden. If you don’t consider yourself the gardener you hope to be, I invite you to follow this and future advice and you’ll soon be surprised at how much more the miracles in nature will mean to you.