Restoring a Big Tree

[pogrmman]

I haven’t been active here in about a year, but I still love growing pomegranates. I’ve been trying to clean up my biggest pomegranate that had never been pruned for the past couple years, but it seems to be nearly futile. Whatever I do seems to encourage endless amounts of vigorous growth that makes it even worse.

I obviously need to get rid of the seemingly endless amount of suckers, but beyond that do you guys have any tips?

Please pardon my sad looking bananas off to the side.

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[pombazaar]

Do you get fruit from this tree? I think the overall shape is great but would identify some of the larger excess branches that can be cut back, particularly on the right side. I prune really heavy now a days and have seen significant increase in growth and fruit production.

[pogrmman]

Do you get fruit from this tree? I think the overall shape is great but would identify some of the larger excess branches that can be cut back, particularly on the right side. I prune really heavy now a days and have seen significant increase in growth and fruit production.

I do get fruit set, but my entire crop is usually destroyed by squirrels :/

I think that I do generally need to thin the tree up so it’s not quite so dense but that also seems to promote super vigorous, vertical growth that doesn’t set many flowers. (Though that also may be a side effect of being in the same bed as the bananas which get tons of water and fertilizer).