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How much to cut back.
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Posted by recoil_rob 6 (My Page) on Sat, Nov 7, 09 at 17:34
| I had a dismal season, my fruits barely matured. I need to cut back I've been told that I should cut back to within 2-3 nodes of the stem
What is a node?
When is a stem a main stem?
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Follow-Up Postings:
RE: How much to cut back.
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A node is the location of a leaf growth on a branch with some tell-tale signs of a leaf gone with the winds where future shoots can grow. Sometimes the node location is obvious with tiny dots in circular form on the branch and other time not so obvious but one can detect a small traffic bump at the node location.
Main stem: your first plant actually has three main stems from the ground but the stem on the left really has three quasi-main-stems so the plant can be treated as a 5 stem plant for pruning purposes. Side stems are the ones branching out from these main branches.
Your plant is very leggy. If it was my plant, I will prune it a little cautiously the first year cutting the 5 main branches at 18" from the ground and then the side branches on the main stems at location 2 to 3 nodes away from the main stems.
However, I have seen very generous pruning than this!
The choice is yours. Goo dluck.
I was going to show you an example of real short pruning but it is not there any more on the site http://figs4fun.com/basics_Pruning.html
May be that fig grew back on the site. |
RE: How much to cut back.
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I wrote above "A node is the location of a leaf growth on a branch with some tell-tale signs of a leaf gone with the winds where future shoots can grow."
Well that is generally true but not necessarily the case that there has to be a leaf. I just looked at the one week old fast growth on my Conadria and noticed that there is a distinct node position like a girdle and two small geen flaps like a two wings of a fly but no sign of a leaf on the node and two other leaves grown after the node. I doubt any leaf is going to grow on this node. |
RE: How much to cut back.
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Rob I don't know how long you had those in the same pot or how large they are. Along with cutting back you might want to root prune and add some fresh soil
Sal |
RE: How much to cut back.
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| Thanks for the help. They have been in the tubs for a couple of years. Is there a primer on how to root prune and should it be done now or in the spring? BTW, can the cuttings be started as new plants now? thanks, Rob |
RE: How much to cut back.
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RE: How much to cut back.
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- Posted by ejp3 7NY (My Page) on
Mon, Nov 16, 09 at 15:33
| I root prune when the trees are fully dormant so as not to stimulate growth. As far as starting cuttings now, it can be done but most people (myself included) feel its better to wait until later. |
RE: How much to cut back.
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| Read steps 9-13 on the following link, and look at the corresponding pictures to understand root pruning. |
Here is a link that might be useful: Growing in pots, root pruning, etc.
RE: How much to cut back.
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| Thanks for the link satellitehead. Any idea where I could find some of those large thick pots he grows his mature trees in? |
RE: How much to cut back.
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| Don't thank me, thank the figs4fun.com folks! amazing group of people over there at their forum, and Jon is good about having superior information about figs at the website. I don't know about the pots, but if you find them, let me know. You may try contacting Bill and see if he can tell you. I'm going to need two of them for my deck late next year, or the year after. Those things are beauties, eh? |
RE: How much to cut back.
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| satellitehead I contacted Bill and he answered fast and friendly. What a great guy. The pots are $ 55.00 each and $ 20.00 shipping which is a little to steep for me as I have a lot of trees. Its a shame though as I really like his method and pots that size without holes are impossible to find. While searching I did find some really big pots with holes reasonably priced. I will likely up-pot 6-10 of my larger trees this year with the pots I found though I'm sure his method would be better. It's just to expensive for me. |
RE: How much to cut back.
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| Wait - so does Bill make them, sell them, or make them and sell them? Thanks for touching back on this, I appreciate your prompt reply as much as I'm sure you appreciate Bill's! |
RE: How much to cut back.
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| Hi satellitehead Bill said he gets them from a place that only sells them in pallets of 64. If you want to buy less than 64 at a time you need to go through him as he has extras and is willing to sell them. |
RE: How much to cut back.
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| Good info! I may contact and see if he will combine shipping on a couple come late spring. Thanks again! |
RE: How much to cut back.
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| Couldn't you make your own. The pots may not be as thick, but you can easily plug any holes with black rubber corks. I've used these several times to use pots for fountains. Just my two cents. Tim |
RE: How much to cut back.
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| I'm sure I could, but ... see how the red pots in the post above are cracking? They're probably less than 5 years old. This, unfortunately, has happend with most of my pots. The ones Bill has are guaranteed for 20yrs. If I go with something harder, terra cotta pots are exorbitantly expensive, and can't easily be drilled out, even with masonry bits (ask my old roomate, he blew through about 10 bits drilling a single hole in the bottom of a few small pots). Overall, for the sheee size and rigidity of those pots, and the material being what it is, they are pretty good containers. The only way for me to go cheaper would be going with Ray Givan's potting setup, which, from what I saw, incorporates cutting a 55gal blue drum in half and using the bottom side of it w/drip irrigation. And the two I want are going to be corner pieces on my rear deck, so I want something that isn't a big blue mess, hackishly cut in half. Besides - with rain barrel popularity, I'm still going to be spending $75 on a barrel, so ... not much savings... I gotta say, I think $55 is a good deal. And if shipping was combined, @ $110 + $20 ship for two pots...that could be a heck of a deal. I'd prefer to source them locally, but then again...why buy run around trying to find something like that locally when I could help a fellow fig nut and just save the gas? |
RE: How much to cut back.
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| I went to Bill's and was impressed with his slick bottom-watering pot system. He has mature trees in them that are enormous so there appears to be little question that they work for figs. I've been growing bottom-watered tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, etc. on my deck for about 5 years and have put together several "home-brew" versions of the Earth box/Grow box containers that function well. Bill's are unquestionably superior, structurally and cosmetically, to my crude, cobbled-together version, but they are a little too expensive for my budget now that I've gotten a little past...okay, WAY past...a half-dozen containers of figs. You can find local sources for 55 Gallon food-grade barrels on Ebay for around $15 and dress them up to look better by wrapping them with reed mats or some other material. I made square enclosures out of the decking cut-offs from our deck project and set my bottom-watering pots in them. Then I put cocoa matting around the inside edges to hide the blue plastic. If you haven't tried it before and you are putting together a bottom-watering system, it can be time-consuming, especially the first 1 or 2. If price isn't a problem or/or you only need 2 or 3, go with Bill's pots. |
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