How to Thin Out Fruit Trees

There is good reason to thin fruit trees early because when you thin fruit trees you are removing some of the fruit when it is immature. You are not harming the tree or the fruit by letting the fruit that you leave on the tree so it can grow bigger. The flesh will grow whereas the pit will not. But you will be getting bigger fruit when you do this.

What is interesting is that the fruit buds show up on the tree a year before the fruit actually grows. You do prune some of these off in the fall but not enough for a full prune. Pruning also removes excess fruit that could cause the limbs to break. Plus on young trees the fruit production can cause stunted growth and once stunted, they will not ever have a strong fruit growth.

Which Trees to Thin?

When you have fruit trees they don’t always produce the same amount of fruit every year but some types produce better in alternate years so would need to be thin in years when they produce the heavier crop. If you are unsure what type you have contact a local tree authority for advice. The bushes or trees and shrubs that have long stems such as cherries don’t need thinning. 

You will need to thin trees with fruit growing in clusters when the fruit is about nickel size whereby you break up the clusters and leave one fruit. Remove the fruit so that the remaining fruit is 6-8” apart. When you do this, remove any damaged or the smaller fruit first, working your way to the healthier fruit. Sometimes you can do this if you shake or jerk the limb making the fruit come off. Hand thin after this if this doesn’t remove enough of the fruit. You also need to thin the fruit on the older trees even if the fruit growth is low. The resulting fruit is smaller due to the tree’s age. Weak or poorly growing trees need thinning so they can grow and not produce as much crop.

These trees should have the fruit removed when the flowers are finished. Do this on trees with short stemmed fruits so they don’t damage each other. Also fruits which grow on bushes like blackberries, blueberries, or raspberries don’t require any thinning as they are fine on their own.