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Caring for Plum Trees Tips on pruning, thinning, fertilizing and more From "Fresh From the Orchard" episode DFFO-104

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Japanese plums produce thousands of blooms (about 100,000 flowers per tree). European plums bloom later than Japanese plums, and not as profusely.

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Because they produce so heavily, Japanese plums must be thinned in order to produce a decent crop and to keep the branches from getting so heavy that they break. Thinning involves removing some of the immature fruit and should be done when the fruit is about dime-sized in diameter. Remove the smallest fruit and keep the larger ones, keeping about one fruit per 5" of shoot. European plums, on the other hand, do not usually need thinning.

Annual Fertilization

It's best to fertilize trees based on a soil sample test. If soil sample test results are not available, however, a common recommendation is to fertilize twice a year, applying 10-10-10 or 5-10-10 in early spring, about a month before bloom, and again in midsummer.

Weed Control

Figure C

Weeds and grass compete with the trees for water and nutrients, so it's best to keep weeds well away from fruit trees. As a general rule of thumb, maintain a weed- and grass-free zone about 3' in diameter around the base of a tree.

Mulches can be used to help with weed control, but be sure that the mulch does not touch the trunk of the tree itself (figure C). Mulch that touches a tree trunk can cause rot and can encourage voles and other small rodents to chew on the base of the tree.

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