About the Trees
Maintenance
Pruning
Pruning has two main objectives:
- to produce a tree of the desired shape and size
- to keep the canopy young, vigorous and productive
The basic requirement for machine harvesting is a clear trunk between 0.9 - 1.2m.
Eden Valley’s trees have been pruned to a bushy vase shape with clear trunks to 1m and kept at a manageable height for hand and mechanical harvesting.
The basic shaping for our trees began in the second growing season with sucker cutting being carried out biannually and pruning annually after harvest. This continual maintenance has shaped our trees into a more easily managed commercial grove with the added benefits of increased annual harvests.
Weed Control
Controlling weed growth to stop competition for water and nutrients is an essential part of grove management. In our grove, we commence our weed control program initially after planting by keeping a 1.5 metre weed free zone from the base of the trunks. The grass and weeds outside this weed free zone are also kept down with regular slashing.
As the trees mature, establishment of the weed free zone benefits the tree through:
- increasingly less weed competition
- more absorption of water and nutrients
- easier maintenance in fertilising, sucker cutting and pruning
- keeps wildlife away from trunks and roots
- easier harvesting
Fertilising
The mix of nutrients to be given vary from grove to grove and to put back into your trees the nutritional equivalent of the fruit picked requires leaf analysis done on an annual basis.
Leaf analysis is carried out annually mid summer, (from CSRIO), when the trees are working hardest and nutrient levels are at their lowest.
The analysis forms the basis of our annual fertilising program.