July-August 2026
Hello to all our garden orchard friends from Dan and Henry at Real English Fruit!
This newsletter naturally concentrates on the effects of the drought on garden fruit trees. This year has seen a serious lack of rain combined with exceptionally high temperatures.
One of the principal signs of tree stress is the presence of yellowing leaves, which can be caused by a lack of moisture. Yellowing or wilting of the trees, or both, are signs of severe drought. In this case, the solution is to water the trees in whatever way possible.
If permitted, use a hosepipe. If there is a hosepipe ban in your area, use a watering can. One full watering can every couple of days will be greatly appreciated by a tree, although the exact amount of water and frequency of watering will vary according to the tree’s size, age, soil and local conditions.
If you have an irrigation system based on drip, trickle or mini-sprinklers, this can be ideal, as it allows water to be delivered gradually to the soil around the tree.
If a tree is suffering badly from drought stress, you can also reduce the strain on it by removing some of the developing fruit.
After watering regularly for a few days, you can use a long screwdriver to check how far moisture has penetrated into the soil. If it pushes easily into the ground and comes out with moist soil adhering to it, the water is reaching below the surface. Remember that a little water sprinkled onto the surface is much less useful than a thorough watering that penetrates deeply into the root zone.
Young trees are particularly vulnerable to drought and can die if they are not watered. Older, established trees are generally more resilient, but prolonged drought can still weaken them and affect their growth and cropping for several seasons. We therefore recommend regular visits to your trees to make sure that they are coping with the dry conditions.
Light inside the tree
While lack of moisture is the principal problem facing fruit trees at the moment, this can also be a useful time to improve tree structure by removing selected excess growth and allowing more light into the canopy, particularly towards the centre of the tree.
Leaves at the top and outside of a dense tree canopy may receive full sunlight, while leaves deep inside the canopy can receive only a small fraction of the available light. This can result in weaker fruiting wood and fruit with less colour and lower sugar levels.
That’s why carefully thinning the canopy of an old fruit tree can improve productivity, even though the process removes some of the tree’s leaves. The aim is not simply to reduce the amount of growth, but to improve the distribution of light throughout the tree.
However, during very hot, dry weather, pruning should be conservative: suddenly exposing previously shaded branches and fruit to intense sunlight can increase heat and sunburn stress.
Identifying fruit trees
One of the services that we can offer is identifying garden fruit trees and estimating their variety and age. This is not an easy task because, considering apples alone, there are about 3,000 different varieties in the UK alone. At the same time, we can give you information on how to look after these varieties nutritionally in order to produce the best results.
