There are both red and black currants, and the sweet fruits are often used in baked goods or canned goods as well as dried for many purposes. Cutting currants - this is one of the most important care work in connection with the cultivation of the berries. The following information about pruning berries will help you get the shape of the plant and to provide more flowers and a larger harvest.
When cut currants?
Cutting currant bushes is an annual process that should take place in the resting phase of the plant. The cut requires the annual removal of the oldest wood in early spring. Currant bushes form a low -growing shrub. For fruit production, the gardener has to learn how to cut them. Cutting is necessary to maintain the shape of the plant, remove sick material and, above all, to keep the interior of the plant open.
How to do the cut right?
Cut back to the next growth point to promote the branch. The next growth point can be seen from a slight swelling in the wood, and in early spring even a little green can be emptied. Start removing all the sticks that are older than three years.The fruits becomeformed on the three -year wood that must be preserved. Broken and dead wood is removed annually, and something has to be examined to improve air and light permeability.
The cut of currants has the greatest impact on the amount and quality of the fruits. Without a cut, the harvests are becoming more and more miserable - too much old, unproductive wood! An annual winter average and spring feeding stimulate the new shoot and give you a yield of around 5 kg of delicious fruits per shrub. Yummy!
Why cut currants?
What do you achieve when you cut your currants?
- Cut out the old to stimulate the new.
- Cut out the damaged and dead to prevent diseases.
- Cut out weak and messy out to get larger and better fruits.
- Opening of shrubs for light and air for maturation and health.
How do you differentiate one, two or three years of wood?
Black currants only have a few fruits of one -year wood, most of them in two years of wood. Red currants (also gooseberries) never bear fruit on the one -year wood. The fruits come on the two- and three-year-old wood. If the thought of one, two or three years of wood worries you- don't worry, the difference is obvious if you know what you are looking for.
One -year -old wood is smooth, thin and of light color. It looks fresh - like a one -year wood! Two- and three-year-old wood differs from one-year wood in that the wood becomes thicker every year, gets more drives and becomes darker. It loses its smooth texture and is marbled. You will also see the small side shoots,on which the berrieshave grown in the previous year - maybe even a few shriveled fruits hang on it.
Your task as a circumcision is to set up a three -year cycle. Let the drive that grows in the first year, become fat and develop into two years of wood (black currant) or three years of wood (red currant). Then his best years are over - it's time to remove it and stimulate a new one.
Small differences between black and red currants
There is a small difference in the way the individual currants wear fruits, which results in a small difference in the way we cut them.
How to cut black currants:
- Cut out old wood rigorously and as close as possible. Until you have got used to the appearance of the old wood, it can be easier to cut out the branches immediately after the harvest in summer. Remove the branches with the strong growth (2-year-old) and leave the branches with the light growth (one-year-old).
- Do not cut anything on the black currant unless a branch is far ahead of the others. In this case, shorten it back to a similar length to a balancedTo maintain shrub. Always cut on an outward nipper.
- Black currants are cut back more than red currants - a total of about a third of the shrub is removed.
How to cut red currants:
- Cut a selection of the oldest wood as close as possible to the base. If a lot of new shoots develop from the older wood, you have the choice. (These new shoots will bear fruit next summer.)
- Either shorten the older branch back to an outward growing new drive, or leave the branch for another year and cut all drives back by a third, or remove it at the base if it loads the shrub too much.
- Each of these options is fine - just choose the one that feels/fits.
- Shorten all branches and shoots by about a third and cut them back to an outward nippe. This stimulates the fruit runner - for more grew in summer.
