Selective pruning of citrus trees is needed to manipulate the partitioning of carbohydrates between various tree parts. In well-managed citrus orchards proper pruning practices will likely have the most significant impact on optimizing yield and fruit size. Inferior flowering wood is removed at specific phenological stages (as soon as possible after harvest in winter or as early in spring as possible). Smaller heading-back and thinning cuts are made throughout the canopy to weaken the trees’ regrowth vigor and to open trees to light, in an attempt to balance fruiting and regrowth.
Four to six months after the first pruning regrowth should be thinned out and manipulated to optimize the trees bearing potential. when pruning is done before spring budbreak many beneficially effects have been reported like; Less variation between fruit, improved internal -, and external quality, improved yield, and fruit size. Pruning also helps the producer control the size and form of the tree, which makes it easier to manage and thus selective pruning should be an important part of an integrated fruit production (IFP) strategy (Krajewski & Pittaway, 2000).
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Source:
Timothy Pittaway
Andrew Krajewski
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