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Hello everyone. I have some mahaleb cherry and crabapple seedlings and want to give their trunks a dramatic shape while they are still flexible. What is the best season to do it: in spring or early fall? I live in a fairly cold climate, the temperature in greenhouse can drop to -5C. Strong bends create micro wounds, will the tree have time to heal them before December, if it’s done in September? I’m also considering doing it in the spring, but this is a period of strong sap flow, maybe it will be difficult to do it on mahaleb cherries and crabapples, or I’m wrong?

I have been bending craps yearround without issue. Main problem later in the year is that the trunk gets dry and brittle. I woulc wire and bend now.

leatherback wrote: I have been bending craps yearround without issue. Main problem later in the year is that the trunk gets dry and brittle. I woulc wire and bend now.

I would have thought bending would work best when the major growth is happening, so March or so to September or so, depending on climate. If the tree is not growing - that is, getting thicker - will bending have any effect?

Ivan Mann wrote:

leatherback wrote: I have been bending craps yearround without issue. Main problem later in the year is that the trunk gets dry and brittle. I woulc wire and bend now.

I would have thought bending would work best when the major growth is happening, so March or so to September or so, depending on climate. If the tree is not growing - that is, getting thicker - will bending have any effect?

well.. When I answered that was in your period of refernce right?

As for, will it do something when bending later: It prepares for next year. And winter is not stand-still time. There is growth (GRowth rings: A wide one in summer, a dense narrow one in winter). I find that late-summer/ early fall wired young branches on many deciduous set byt spring / budbreak. Challenge is frost. If you get frost a later wired branch may be too damaged to deal with frost and die off. And some species just do not like to be wired in late fall / winter and drop branches no matter the weather

There are several of the trees I know what I will do with, so maybe I'll get some wiring out of the way. The azaleas in particular.

That will take some of the load off of the spring repotting, etc., heavy period.

I guess wire some branches, leave alone the ones that will be pruned, and cut them off in March, or whenever the tree decides spring is.