Jon, Thanks for the comments. I may have chose the wrong verb. We
did "remove" the very youngest leaves at the growing tip - the
smallest leaves we could get our fingers on without removing the
actual meristem. It is my understanding as well that auxin comes from
those very young leaves.
Chris
Quoting Jon Clements <[email protected]>:
That is nice work Chris, SARE got their money's worth. My only comment, is
when I have seen "pinching" used to promote branching in nursery trees, it
seems to me they pinch or cut the very newest leaves which are producing
the auxin that inhibits lateral branch development. You may have been
removing leaves that are too old? Pinching or cutting is done though to
preserve the growing tip, which is a bit buried beneath the newly emerged
leaves. See attached, for example, where the pinch or cut would be made
while protecting the growing tip.
Or, I may be all wet on this...anyone else?
Jon
[image: cutorpinchhere.png]
On Tue, Feb 19, 2019 at 12:17 PM Chris McGuire | Two Onion Farm <
[email protected]> wrote:
Hello,
At our orchard this past year we received a small grant from the USDA-SARE
program for on-farm research to evaluate organic methods for promoting
branching in nursery apple trees. As part of the project we are sharing
our results with other growers - hence this email.
Very briefly, we were looking for a way to raise well-feathered trees.
Commercial nurseries often use synthetic plant growth regulators to promote
branching. We tried tearing off young leaves near the growing tip as well
as spraying an OMRI-listed seaweed extract high in cytokinins. Tearing off
the leaves did have a small effect and produced about one extra feather per
tree. The seaweed extract spray actually decreased branching slightly.
You can read the full report of our project here:
http://www.twoonionfarm.com/research/. I'm happy to answer any questions
by email.
Regards, Chris McGuire
--
Chris & Juli McGuire
Two Onion Farm
www.twoonionfarm.com
19638 Cottage Inn Road
Belmont, WI 53510
(608) 762-5335 (office)
(608) 726-2550 (cell)
[email protected]
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--
JMCEXTMAN (aka Jon Clements)
413.478.7219 Verizon
413.378.3068 Project Fi
UMass Cold Spring Orchard
393 Sabin Street
Belchertown, MA 01007
http://umassfruit.com
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