Winter pruning measures of Castanea mollissima trees in full fruiting period

To do a good job in winter pruning of chestnut trees in the full fruit period is an effective measure to prolong the full fruit period and prevent the occurrence of fruit in large and small years.

I. selective pruning

The period of winter pruning of Chinese chestnut is from half a month after defoliation to half a month before sprouting in spring, that is, from mid-December to early February of the following year, but it should be delayed in case of freezing weather.

Second, get rid of inferior pruning

When pruning, we should first cut off all the inferior branches such as disease and insect branches, overlapping branches, dry and withered branches, cross branches and weak branches, so as to improve the ventilation and light transmission conditions in the crown and concentrate nutrition to make the branches sturdy and full. about 50 cm should be left for cutting off the top branch and its backbone branch every year, so as to promote the development of new branches, increase the number of fruiting mother branches, and control the speed of outward movement of fruiting parts.

Third, thinning and dense fruit branches

For the dense fruit-bearing mother branches in the past, it is necessary to remove part of the fruit-bearing branches, or truncated parts as regeneration branches. Before the crown meets each other, about 15 fruiting mother branches can be retained per square meter of crown area; after the crown joining each other, about 12 fruiting mother branches should be retained, and the overgrowing fruiting mother branches should be properly cut short to promote the lower part of them to send out new branches. the aging fruiting mother branches should be retracted in order to concentrate nutrition to promote new branches and cultivate them into fruiting mother branches to continue fruiting.

IV. Adapting measures to local conditions

The pruning of Chinese chestnut depends on the soil quality and tree potential. The soil is fertile, the soil layer is deep, and the trees that are strong should be light rather than heavy, otherwise vice versa. If winter pruning can be carried out simultaneously with fertilization, we can get twice the result with half the effort.