Pruning is the removal by cutting away of over grown stems and/ or branches as a way of rehabilitating the avocado tree.
Pruning is important because it ensures that there is regeneration of the tree, helps control the height of the tree because when the trees are too tall, the fruits will get damages during harvesting and pest and disease control will be hard.
Other benefits
Pruning has direct positive impacts to yield and quality. It increases yield because it increases the tree‘s exposure to sunlight yet flowering and fruiting in avocado is more when the tree is exposed to sunlight.
Fruit quality is improved because the exposure to light and free flow of air reduces the incidence of fungal diseases.
After pruning, a lot of trash is produced and this can be used as mulch in the orchard. This decomposes and releases nutrients back to the soil.
Types of pruning
There are three major types of pruning ie light pruning, medium pruning and heavy pruning. Light and medium pruning are maintenance pruning where few branches are removed.
In heavy pruning, the tree is cut down about a metre from the ground and all major branches removed. In this type of pruning, the tree comes back to production at about 25% production capacity and after 4 years from pruning, the tree comes to full capacity production.
