I HAVE DONE BOTH AND ONE WIRE IS DIFFICULT, TIME CONSUMING, and EXPENSIVE OVER TIME. The single wire system is a maintenance nightmare. I KNOW OF NO COMMERCIAL ORCHARDS USING THE OUTDATED SYSTEM. First problem is small trees have no easy place to tie to . Another huge problem with stakes is as the orchard matures and fruit load increases it is harder to keep the trellis system from tilting. What happens is the stakes act as pivot poles or fulcrums and just tilt. The top wire cannot be tighten enough to hold the system straight. With multiple wires the system sages down with a smaller tendency to push over. As the orchard ages 10-15 years suddenly stakes need replacement as one wire will not support the trellis. Difficult, expensive, and unnecessary.
John Belisle BelleWood Acres From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Randy Steffens Jr Sent: Monday, February 28, 2011 6:43 AM To: Apple-crop discussion list Subject: Re: [apple-crop] Vertical Scaffold Spacing For those who have high-density orchards, do you find trellising with one wire at about 9 feet provides sufficient support, if a bamboo stake or the like is placed at each tree? Randy Steffens Jr Shepherd's Valley Orchards Middle Tennessee On Feb 28, 2011, at 6:55 AM, Con.Traas wrote: I agree with Terence and Dave, Their experience and concerns have been borne out here in Ireland over the past number of years, where it has been survival of the more dense (orchards rather than orchardists). Obviously there are limits, but in our own case, for our single line orchards we have opted for 4 ft. x 11ft., and we have found this a good spacing for the more vigorous Elstar variety (more vigorous than Golden Delicious or Jonagold at least). We do not grow the trees as high as at lower latitudes (more mutual shading from taller trees when you come this far North), and have found that a limit of about 5 ½ to 6 feet height of cropping wall works well. In practice, this wall commences about 2 feet above the ground, and finishes at 7.5 feet, facilitating all harvesting and pruning from ground level. Con Traas _______________________________________________ apple-crop mailing list [email protected] http://virtualorchard.net/mailman/listinfo/apple-crop
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