I know it's an old thread, but I came across it and felt I could add something for other people wondering the same thing. Wow, so ok, this thread is... very interesting? Went from somewhat helpful to nursery bashing lol. There are four ways to control vigor/ size in a tree: Precocity, spacing, dwarfing rootstocks, and pruning out large branches. You can plant them 2ft apart in the row and 8ft alleys as a spindle if you want, or 20 ft apart as an open vase if you want (hint: the spindle is going to yield more than the vase per acre). The biggest thing to maximizing yields is maximizing bearing surface and light interception per acre. I use dual-leader UFO (upright fruiting offshoot) training for everything now. UFO was originally developed for spur-fruiting species (apples, plums, pears, cherries), but it can be modified to work with tip and year-old-growth bearing species (some apples, peaches, apricots). You just have to space out your uprights more and allow for limited lateral branching. For peaches, I plant trees 8 feet apart in row, with 7ft alleys (I use a TYM 234 tractor). I plant the trees at roughly a 45 degree angle. I allow the uprights on the primary leader to grow (keep terminal bud upright), and select one below the bottom cordon to train as the second leader. I then remove the other buds below the bottom wire. By the end of 1st leaf, you should have both leaders tied to the wire, and mostly filled the space between trees, you've pruned off the pendant shoots, and you should have some fruiting wood for next year. In the winter, tip back the fruit sticks and eliminate damaged/crowded wood. second leaf- limited fruiting possible, focus on establishing your uprights roughly every 10 inches (6 inches for spur bearing species) and finish filling in the space. Eliminate pendant wood, shoots sticking outside of the vertical plane, and any uprights beyond your "permanent" ones in late summer, after any harvest (limited regrowth that way). Next year's fruiting wood is now on the upright shoots. Tip back the fruit sticks and eliminate damaged/crowded fruiting wood. Third Leaf- should definitely get fruit, goal is to get your upright shoots to the top wire (which for a should be roughly 75% of your alley width, IMO). Same kind of pruning as previous years. At some point, your laterals are going to start to grow together, at that point, you need to do renewal pruning in the winter back to a bud near the upright. Once your uprights get to about 1.25x your alley width, head the uprights back to on bud above the top wire (otherwise you'll shade the bottom of the next row). As uprights approach 3/4 to 1 inch diameter at the base, take the largest one every year down to one bud above the leader (unlike apples and cherries, peaches don't regenerate as readily, so you need to give it the best chance). All renewal type pruning should be done before budbreak, to encourage vigorous regrowth.

I know this is an old one but I'm looking for advice on contorted mulberries. I've had mine for 2+ years and it's getting huge. Over 6 feet tall and 5' wide. I have gotten flowers every spring but never any fruit. I haven't ever pruned it and a few branches have gotten too heavy for the tree to hold and fell over. There doesn't appear to be much damage and the leaves stayed green while it healed. I'm just wondering if I should prune it for next year to help it fruit or if it's maybe a fertilizer issue. I didn't do any fert. the first two years and this year I put compost on it in Feb. It didn't appear to change anything as far as fruiting. Just flowers then nothing. I may not have put enough on it or put in on at the wrong time.

To get the best response for this question, contact your state's MG program or post on the shrub forum.

Even if it's not the fastest or easiest, the best way to achieve any goal is to choose the route that best ensures success, and avoid choosing a path solely because it offers the chance of success. I'll provide you with an outline of the actions needed to return the plant to a much higher state of vitality (health), while making allowances for the plant's weakness and taking advantage of its coming strengths. First, some questions. Where do you live? Would you provide an image of the plant and pot, and perhaps an image of what's going on under the hemp mat? Has the plant ever been fully repotted (includes bare-rooting, root pruning, and a change of soil. Do you fertilize regularly? .... with what? .... when last? Does the pot have a drain hole? .... and, after watering do you allow the pot to sit in any effluent that exits the drain hole? When you water, do you ensure the entire soil column is moistened and a good measure of water flushes through the soil, carrying mineral build-up from tapwater and fertilizer solutions out of the pot? The plant definitely needs a hard pruning, but now isn't a good time to prune, and your plant is too weak to do the kind of pruning required to reduce the plant to a framework you can build on. IOW, between now and an appropriate time to prune (possibly as early as this coming June, if you live in the Northern Hemisphere), the best use of time would be by focusing on betterment of the plant's vitality so it's able to tolerate the hard pruning. To do that, I would: * Figure out a way you can flush the soil as you water. That will 'reset' the level of fertility to close to 0. * After flushing, fertilize with a full production strength solution. I highly recommend using Foliage-Pro 9-3-6, as it contains ALL nutrients essential to normal growth, from a single source. It has many other attributes as well. * Start using a 'tell' to 'tell' you when it's time to water. More re using a tell below. Move the plant outdoors as soon as night temps are reliably above 55*. This will make a big difference in the plant's level of vitality. Currently, on a 1-10 scale with 10 being the peak of health, your plant is probably a 3, so it needs your help. * The plant will respond very favorably to being outdoors. Once it's pushing some new growth, it can be repotted. The best timing of that depends on where you live, but it will be sometime in June for Ficus in the Northern Hemisphere. Leaves are individual factories where the plant's true food (sugar/glucose) is synthesized, so removing green leaves by way of pruning always represents a setback. That's fine when a plant is robust/healthy and it's ability to make food is at or approaching peak levels, but your tree is not a good candidate for any type of pruning other than pinching, and pinching will not provide you with the response required to fix the fact that all foliage on major branches is concentrated at branch tips where new extension growth occurs. That is occurring likely because the plant is very root-bound The plant's level of vitality is not a constant. All else equal, it will be weaker in late fall through early spring than at any other part of its growth cycle, which is why it's best to do serious work like hard pruning and repotting in the weeks immediately prior to the summer solstice. The reason is simple - your plant will tolerate the work better and recover faster when light is most intense and days longest Using a 'tell' Over-watering saps vitality and is one of the most common plant assassins, so learning to avoid it is worth the small effort. Plants make and store their own energy source – photosynthate - (sugar/glucose). Functioning roots need energy to drive their metabolic processes, and in order to get it, they use oxygen to burn (oxidize) their food. From this, we can see that terrestrial plants need plenty of air (oxygen) in the soil to drive root function. Many off-the-shelf soils hold too much water and not enough air to support the kind of root health most growers would like to see; and, a healthy root system is a prerequisite to a healthy plant. Watering in small sips leads to avoid over-watering leads to a residual build-up of dissolved solids (salts) in the soil from tapwater and fertilizer solutions, which limits a plant's ability to absorb water – so watering in sips simply moves us to the other horn of a dilemma. It creates another problem that requires resolution. Better, would be to simply adopt a soil that drains well enough to allow watering to beyond the saturation point, so we're flushing the soil of accumulating dissolved solids whenever we water; this, w/o the plant being forced to pay a tax in the form of reduced vitality, due to prolong periods of soil saturation. Sometimes, though, that's not a course we can immediately steer, which makes controlling how often we water a very important factor. In many cases, we can judge whether or not a planting needs watering by hefting the pot. This is especially true if the pot is made from light material, like plastic, but doesn't work (as) well when the pot is made from heavier material, like clay, or when the size/weight of the pot precludes grabbing it with one hand to judge its weight and gauge the need for water. Fingers stuck an inch or two into the soil work ok for shallow pots, but not for deep pots. Deep pots might have 3 or more inches of soil that feels totally dry, while the lower several inches of the soil is 100% saturated. Obviously, the lack of oxygen in the root zone situation can wreak havoc with root health and cause the loss of a very notable measure of your plant's potential. Inexpensive watering meters don't even measure moisture levels, they measure electrical conductivity. Clean the tip and insert it into a cup of distilled water and witness the fact it reads 'DRY'. One of the most reliable methods of checking a planting's need for water is using a 'tell'. You can use a bamboo skewer in a pinch, but a wooden dowel rod of about 5/16” (75-85mm) would work better. They usually come 48” (120cm) long and can usually be cut in half and serve as a pair. Sharpen all 4 ends in a pencil sharpener and slightly blunt the tip so it's about the diameter of the head on a straight pin. Push the wooden tell deep into the soil. Don't worry, it won't harm the root system. If the plant is quite root-bound, you might need to try several places until you find one where you can push it all the way to the pot's bottom. Leave it a few seconds, then withdraw it and inspect the tip for moisture. For most plantings, withhold water until the tell comes out dry or nearly so. If you see signs of wilting, adjust the interval between waterings so drought stress isn't a recurring issue. Questions ..... or was that informational overload. Don't be shy about asking questions. If you're serious about honing your growing skills, the key will be gaining a better understanding of how your plant works and how to work WITH the plant's natural rhythms instead of just ignoring them. Al