Re: Prunus Maritima aka Beach Plum What month do you prune trees? I have apple, pear, peach, plum, and roses. Please tell me when to do this . I'm new at this. Thank you.
I tend to do dormant season pruning for fruit trees in january and february around here, on the west coast of Canada.
Correct as a general rule you only prune fruit trees when they are dormant. You need to take into account the degree of die back in each specie if you prune it after leaf fall in autumn or before the beginning of spring. If you prune before the buds start to swell, then you need not worry about die-back. With roses that are hardier you prune them by early November and defoliate them before spraying and mulching them for the winter, that's what we learn in a Rose Society.
Where are you from ? If newberry ,s. c. stands for "South California", you can probably prune in November immediately after the leaves fall. If you are in a colder place, you'd better wait the end of winter.
In Oregon, I do many apple around January, but have had no problems with pruning in November. I finally talked the last of the die-hard customers out of waiting until Jan. to Feb. as a rule. One lady; it took 4 years, then she said she read that late autumn pruning is fine. I've pruned apple from Nov. 1 to March, with no die-back and no loss of fruit production or size. The best benefit, is no sprouts in the way for better dormant spray coverage if the spray is applied in December. Better coverage, less product used. But I don't prune apple in November as a rule either - it's just an option.
Most of our pruning is done in the spring and summer, especially training cuts. If we cut watershoots and suckers off in the winter, they usually come back with a vengance. Cutting them off in summer puts them away for good. The only winter pruning we do is maintenance, such as dead branches and crossed branches. Trimming central leaders back to a weak leader in the summer also helps control the tree's size, as summer pruning in general is more effective for size control than relying on a dwarfing rootstock. If in South Carolina you are still worrying about freezing, pruning too late in the year before dormancy may give you a flush of new growth that can't harden off in time for winter, but you probably don't have to worry about it.
It varies. A bit colder to the east. Many orchards are east of Portland, like near Hood River. But around Beaverton and Portland, where I was, the colder normal temperatures would dip into the mid-20s. It's been in the teens a few times. Anything colder is possible, but rare. I think Portland's record low was near 0 to 3 degrees F around 1950. Totally off subject, but in checking climate tables, I was amazed to see that Washington, possibly Seattle, got about 48" of snow one January. It was either about 50 or 100 years ago. I recall it being a multiple of 50. That had to be crippling to the economy.