Pruning Fruit - Not the Tree. The Fruit?

[OldGuy43]

As some of you know, I've just planted my first fruit tree, a Brown Turkey Fig. I was browsing the internet for information and found this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGN80PKBx-A

While I didn't watch the whole thing, (It's 13 minutes plus) it appears that this fellow is pruning what he thinks is "the excess fruit" in order to provide the tree with the energy it needs survive the cold New England winters.

I was always taught that most perennial plants go dormant during the winter, and don't need extra energy. (or maybe I just didn't watch enough of the video??)

As always, your ideas and comments will be appreciated.

 

[so lucky]

His reason for pruning may be faulty, but I have read that people will prune off fruit to make the remaining ones bigger, if it is an especially heavy fruiting year. Maybe also to lessen the liklihood of breaking limbs.

 

[897tgigvib]

The Fig bush in my bosse's greenhouse in Montana made tons of smallish figs every year. She did not thin them. Some fell off on their own.

I don't know about Fig fruit thinning in particular, but yes, a lot of domesticated fruit trees need to be thinned of fruit because they will go overboard making lots of large fruits. Apples especially, and some varieties more than others. If they are not thinned, for all the world it is just as if the next year the tree grows as if it is exhausted, and will set few if any apples, and grow poorly.

Sometimes it really is better to have fewer good quality things than a lot of poor quality things. Maybe there are some good websites to be googled that will have info on thinning Figs.

Try typing in the google box something like

"growing figs"

or

"fig production"

Yes, wikipedia makes a good start too. Just look at their blurb at the top about the articles needing citations and things like that.