Matthew Pellerin, an agricultural manager for Treworgy Family Orchards in Levant, ME, is seeking some advice on how to plant a pick-your-own orchard as tall spindle:
“I would like to plant the rows as narrow as possible in combination with shorter trees so the customers can reach more of the fruit. My orchard tractor is 54 inches wide. How narrow can I plant my tall spindle orchard with this equipment? Also, what would be the appropriate tree height at the narrow row spacing? I was thinking of going to a 10-foot-by-3-foot orchard growing Honeycrisp on M26 and Macoun on Bud 9. This spacing puts the tree height at 8.5 feet which will work pretty well for pick-your-own. Will I have to make adjustments in my pruning methodology or will the typical tall spindle pruning and training recommendations work?”
We put that question out to our readers and here are some of the suggestions we received:
- “The newer spacing being recommended by Dr. Terence Robinson from Cornell is around 12-feet-by-3-feet. I highly recommend watching the videos at YouTube he did at the Winter Apple School in Henderson County, NC.”
- “Keeping the tres around 6-foot tall sounds like it would take a very dwarfing rootstock like M27.”
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