posted 6 years ago
Let me expand on my earlier post. First I have to say that I'm in SW Pennsylvania, not in New Mexico, so pardon my possible naive comments. But, I'm hoping the principals are similar for other fruit types.
I bought a semi-dwarf peach tree four years ago, and then the following year found another peach tree from the same source, Stark Bros, that had huge peaches. I bought a full size tree. Last year the first tree was 3 years old. We got maybe a half dozen peaches. This year the newer tree is 3 years old, It's got hundreds of peaches on it. The newer tree has a 3 inch diameter trunk, the older, a 2 inch trunk. I've been removing the smaller peaches from the new/big tree. Also some with insect/bird damage. The older tree had 18 peaches on it, when I counted them 2 weeks ago, and they're smaller. My one neighbor is amazed at the production on the tree. The neighbor on the other side, who does a lot of gardening and has a variety of fruit trees commented on how beautiful the tree is. I responded that I'm developing the impression that dwarf and semi-dwarf trees are usually ugly. If I'd bought a full size tree four years ago I'd have had the 100's of peaches last year, instead of half a dozen. So maybe buying a smaller tree, to get earlier production is a mistake.
The difference in trimming a full and a semi-dwarf is how far you extend your tree trimmer. If you annually trim the top you'll have a larger diameter tree the same height. But leave a short leader there to get the tree growing wider.