bigbendmarine
5 year old buck +
Ok... so a couple of years ago I planted 18 dolgo crabapples in my back yard along a road running down to my pond.
When I put them in I broke what seems to be a cardinal rule I've noticed on the forum. I put them in tree tubes vs cages. The tubes I used were the 5' tall blue colored protex tab style, and I used two per crabapple so that they had some room to leaf and grow (about 8" diameter). They all are still alive, likely averaging about 8' tall now, and with lots of limbs sticking up through the tubes.
Know they need pruning so I'm ready to take on the job but that begs a few questions:
1) With a heavy deer population, just about anything I leave unguarded will get heavily browsed or rubbed when bucks are sporting antlers. With the trees now about 8' high would y'all recommend going ahead and switching over to cages when taking the time to prune? Or if I cut down the tubes to 3' or so and started training fruiting limbs above that point could I still use the tubes?
2) I personally like the look / shape of modified central leader trained trees a bit more than central trained leaders. Does anyone have a strong opinion on using or not training the dolgos to a modified central leader form?
3) Last one relates to another critter threat -- bears. Do those of you with crabapples get lots of damage from bears, and if so do you recommend one pruning style over another to help in any way possible to survive bear damage? I ask as I have 5 or so that cruise through my place from time to time.
Questions above asked, as ALWAYS I fully welcome any additional advice / knowledge offered to questions this "jarhead" might have overlooked asking out of ignorance. ALL input MUCH appreciated!
When I put them in I broke what seems to be a cardinal rule I've noticed on the forum. I put them in tree tubes vs cages. The tubes I used were the 5' tall blue colored protex tab style, and I used two per crabapple so that they had some room to leaf and grow (about 8" diameter). They all are still alive, likely averaging about 8' tall now, and with lots of limbs sticking up through the tubes.
Know they need pruning so I'm ready to take on the job but that begs a few questions:
1) With a heavy deer population, just about anything I leave unguarded will get heavily browsed or rubbed when bucks are sporting antlers. With the trees now about 8' high would y'all recommend going ahead and switching over to cages when taking the time to prune? Or if I cut down the tubes to 3' or so and started training fruiting limbs above that point could I still use the tubes?
2) I personally like the look / shape of modified central leader trained trees a bit more than central trained leaders. Does anyone have a strong opinion on using or not training the dolgos to a modified central leader form?
3) Last one relates to another critter threat -- bears. Do those of you with crabapples get lots of damage from bears, and if so do you recommend one pruning style over another to help in any way possible to survive bear damage? I ask as I have 5 or so that cruise through my place from time to time.
Questions above asked, as ALWAYS I fully welcome any additional advice / knowledge offered to questions this "jarhead" might have overlooked asking out of ignorance. ALL input MUCH appreciated!