How to Prune a Pomegranate Tree? Detailed Guide to Pruning Methods

The pomegranate tree is a deciduous tree or shrub; its leaves are simple, usually opposite or clustered, without stipules. It can be grown both as a fruit tree and as a potted plant.So what are the pruning methods for pomegranate trees?

1. What are the pruning methods for pomegranate trees?

1. Pomegranate trees need pruning every year. Depending on the situation, they can be pruned into a single-trunk round-headed form, or a multi-trunk clump form, etc. In addition, during their fruiting period, water sprouts need summer pinching and autumn shortening, and the suckers emerging at the root collar must also be cut off in time.

2. Pomegranate branches have loose tissue and poor cold resistance. To reduce frost damage, winter pruning should preferably be delayed until late February. Winter pruning often causes excessively vigorous tree growth. Therefore, during the growing period, measures such as bud removal, branch twisting, tip pinching and shoot thinning should also be combined to regulate tree vigor.

3. Pomegranates are sensitive to pruning and tolerate it poorly. Heavy winter pruning produces vigorous spring growth, increasing the number of vegetative branches and affecting the fruit-setting rate; heavy summer pruning in turn weakens tree vigor. Therefore, for weak trees, winter pruning should be appropriately increased, and for vigorous trees, summer pruning should be appropriately increased.

4. Pomegranate pruning mainly consists of thinning branches and leaving them unpruned (slack pruning). Remove aged and dead branches, overly dense and thin weak branches, and upright water sprouts; leave horizontal and slanting branches and diseased or pest-damaged branches unpruned, and shorten only very few extension branches. Too much shortening easily causes excessively vigorous tree growth, which is unfavorable for flower formation and affects the yield of a single tree.

5. Timely thin out sprouting branches (tender shoots produced from suckers), drooping branches, sideways-growing small branches, pest- and disease-damaged branches, and dead branches, so that the branches are suitably sparse and evenly distributed and the canopy has good ventilation and light penetration. When the pomegranate tree finishes flowering, appropriately thin out some thin and weak branches to reduce nutrient consumption.

In addition, pruning of young pomegranate trees should preferably be carried out in February-March of the second year. Keep 1-3 vigorous branches per tree as the trunk-training branches, and remove all the other branches. During July-August, within the space up to 45 cm above the ground, no branches should be left; if any branches appear, thin them out early to favor the growth of the upper lateral branches.