All For Gardening
SA - how to prune lemon tree?
In Gardening Australia

SA – how to prune lemon tree?


Not great with gardening, but gradually starting to improve.

This is a mature lemon tree that was here when we moved in. Hoping for some advice on how best to prune it. We started, but not sure how far to go.

by MixtureOfCrazy

3 Comments

  1. kiwigreenman

    I think you have gone a bit far already . Time to stop .

  2. Important_Fruit

    I’ve seen professionals prune back much further. It will be 2 years to fruit, but great for the health and longevity of the tree. You haven’t gone too far yet.

  3. Fun_Value1184

    It’s early to do heavy pruning like this. 2 options at this point:

    1. stop, spray the whole tree with copper based fungicide spray to limit fungal attack, let it dry then paint the larger trunk/branches that are exposed with non-toxic whitewash (research the correct stuff) wait til winter is past, with a sharp saw, cut the tall upright branches down a lot more (1.5m above ground) and anything facing inwards or crossing over or likely to shade other branches. The tree canopy should look vase shaped and open in the middle. Clean up any poor cuts like the end of the left branch. You could do a hard prune in spring instead as per Option 2 though.

    2. Cut it back a lot more, so that only branches 40mm or more thick are left, 1.5m above the ground, with no foliage. The big branch facing the neighbour cut back to close to the trunk where it tapers. The left branch with 3 upright branches cut it back to remove those branches. Spray with copper based fungicide. Paint the whole tree with non-toxic whitewash.

    Option 1 may get you fruit next year but potentially less fruit in the long-run and there’s risk itll sprout new growth before winter using up vigour and resources that it could’ve used for spring growth.

    Option 2 will delay proper fruiting for 2 seasons or more but should better reinvigorate the tree. To give perspective on how bulletproof lemons are, we have one that’s growing back (for 2nd time) from an underground stump after being cut to ground level after 2020 bushfires and buried.

    With either option, wait til early spring to work in some aged manure around the base and apply citrus fertiliser regularly.
    Don’t fertilise now, but you may want to test and amend the soil incase it’s alkaline.

Pin