This manual has been written for:
- those who want to plant a new Open Tatura orchard with apple trees
- those who must manage such an orchard
- nurserymen who grow apple trees
- anyone concerned with the establishment, management and performance of an Open Tatura apple orchard.
This manual emphasises how to:
- Achieve a full and efficient tree canopy at an early tree age
- Sustain optimum fruit production over the projected life of the orchard
- Produce fruit of high quality and good size.
Since a picture is worth a thousand words, we have used many drawings and pictures to illustrate the important points on how to manage apple trees on Open Tatura.
- 160 pages of information, photos and illustrations
- File download: 11.5 Mb
- Updated and expanded: Jan 2019
List of Topics:
- Producing apples in the 21st century
- tree density, arrangement and size
- tree support structures
- avoid ladders
- Why Open Tatura?
- V-shaped canopies
- labour friendly
- Do it right, from the start
- success is determined in year one!
- consider growth habits
- Pruning
- reasons, timing
- pruning cuts: Heading cut - Thinning cut - Delay heading cut - Bench cut - Clean cut - December cut - Ring cut
- Scion rooting of apple trees
- After planting
- When buds start to move in spring
- Nursery trees
- When you can not plant feathered trees
- Open Tatura
- orchard specifications: planting distance
- methods of training: single leader
- trellis & anchor specifications
- Rootstock choice
- Pollination and fruit set
- Bees, their behaviour and pollination
- Polliniser varieties
- Prepare the soil before planting
- Soil organic matter
- what is it, where does it come from
- amount in the soil
- nutrients, soil stability
- Soil testing
- don't rely only on soil tests
- leaf and sap analysis
- Spreading shoots or branches of young trees
- crotch angles, what is a good angle
- apical dominance
- bending and arching
- when to spread
- Tree management:
- First year
- after planting
- spring time
- Second year
- fill allotted space
- Third year
- add fruiting wood
- The branchless multi-leader concept
- Renewal pruning
- Root pruning
- best time to prune roots
- potential problems
- Crown Gall
- What are burr knots
- Turn blind wood into productive wood
- heading cuts
- double delay-heading
- Benchmarks for marketable yield
- What causes biennial bearing?
- Tree nutrition
- A guide to replace the nutient losses from harvested fruit
- Nitrogen
- How do apples turn red or pink?
- Why do apples sunburn?
- what you can do to control sunburn
- Does overhead cooling avoid sunburn
- some problems
- better solutions
- Hail net NEW
- Net—positives and negatives
- Bee activity
- Type of net, structure, shape
- Net colour
- Calcium
- in the soil
- in the tree
- in the fruit
- what to do to ensure adequate amounts reach the fruit
- What is water core?
- What happens to trees after harvest
- Winter chill for breaking dormancy
- Avoiding frost damage in spring
- two types of frost
- effects of fog, clouds and wind
- monitor frost before is does damage
- Avoid skin russet
- Water and stress
- When are apples ready to harvest?
