Fruit tree holding on by a thread, client wants to get another year out of it. Thoughts?

[climbingmonkey24]

@evo That’s awesome. Quite the ingenuity!

I already quoted the project but honestly pouring concrete never occurred to me.

But I guess maybe for a smaller tree like mine and only one or two smaller limbs it might not be as big of a deal if it’s not anchored into the ground? Or maybe I could rest a board on a cinder block or paver? And perhaps I tell her we should come back the following year to re-evaluate?

 

[Matias]

I saw Sean mention it briefly, but I really wanna emphasize how important fruit thinning is. On a tree that has gotten so heavy with fruit that it breaks it's own branches, it will be necessary to remove most of the fruit set once it's recovered a bit; one to three years. I like to thin to no more than one fruit per cluster, sometimes removing entire clusters when it's very dense with fruit setting. Sometimes there is a good gap between clustera, so I leave two fruit on a lonely cluster. I have removed as much as 80% of the fruit set in heavy years. Every production fruit grower I know that focuses on quality does the same. I know they thin less intesively for max production per acre, but that is not the goal for most homeowners.