Hello, We have lived in our house with a very old (~20 inch diameter trunk) apricot tree. The first year we did a major pruning in the spring and had around 70 lbs of apricots. The next two years we did minor trimming but had no real fruit due to late hail/cold weather. Well, on to this year, we had the most fruit I have ever seen growing on the tree. In a 1ft long branch section we would have 50-60 baby fruits starting. I knew this would not be good, so I did a bunch of thinning, probably removing 1/2 the fruit from the tree very early on. Obviously I didn't do enough, as large branch after branch began breaking off of the tree. I trimmed and supported as much as I could, but they kept breaking. As of right now, I would bet that 75% of the 2nd level (Not the 3 big main branches off of the trunk) have broken off. My question is: what in the world do I do? Would I kill the tree if I trimmed it all the way back to the 3 main branches of the tree? I am so upset that we have lost so much of this tree, but I want to do whatever I can to keep it alive. I know very little about trees, but I have done pretty good with our other trees: 2 cherries, a peach, a plum, and another small apricot. Please point me to any information, or anything I can do. Help!! Thanks, Chris
Well, if the branches are going to break, I suspect less damage would be done if you were the one doing the cutting as opposed to letting the tree develop cracks and such at break points. Sounds like it might also need some corrective pruning in the future on the parts you are bracing (so hopefully you won't have to cut them now) - North Carolina State Univ provides a guide: Training and Pruning Fruit Trees. Note:
Probably related to the earlier heavy pruning, perhaps resulting in a new structure more prone to breakage. A branch here and there failing under weight of heavy crop that has not been thinned is not unusual, but whole (thinned!) tree breaking up seems quite abnormal.
I don't know, we live in the same area and had the same experience this year. Abnormally large crop this year. Apricot trees so full of fruit the branches were snapping off left and right. We had to do some heavy cutting to avoid worse damage.
