How to prune a navel orange

Navel orange pruning is an essential practice to achieve larger sized blemish free fruit that returns the highest price. The first step in pruning is developing a limb structure that maximises the interception of light and spread out enough so new canopy can grow, and workers can have access throughout the tree to manage the canopy and harvest the fruit. The second step is ongoing maintenance so old branches are continuously removed for new branches to grow that bear the larger sized fruit.

The four videos listed below shows the type of limbs to remove, and not remove, to achieve a desirable tree structure and the branches to target when maintenance pruning. These videos are a good way learn how to prune an navel orange tree for growers and as a training video for contract workers.

• Navel pruning PT 1 – Introduction, what is bad wood (4 min)
• Navel pruning PT 2a – Structural pruning core concepts (15 min)
• Navel pruning PT 2b – Structural pruning extra footage (10 min)
• Navel pruning PT 3 – Maintenance pruning (5 min)

Navel pruning PT 1 – Introduction, what is bad wood

Navel pruning PT 2a – Structural pruning core concepts

Navel pruning PT 2b – Structural pruning extra footage

Navel pruning PT 3 – Maintenance pruning