Pruning is the process of trimming or cutting away dead parts of the plant or new shoots to encourage lateral branching.
Pruning is a standard practice in indoor crops where we want crops to go up. In the solanaceae we maintain 1 – 3 stems. In cucurbitaceae usually a single stem. It can also be applied in open field. In addition we also refer to pruning when removing leaves for increasing the ventilation in the crop.
Pruning results in:
- earlier production
- increase in fruit weight
- easier to work in when spaying or harvesting as well more ventilation which will reduce humidity related diseases. Leaf-pruning can start when the fourth cluster is setting.