Establishment of an orchard is a long term investment thus deserving careful planning and management.
Site Selection
Selection of site is important for orchard establishments as most fruit trees are perennial. Climate and soil are the chief natural factors on which success or failure of the orchard depends. In the selection of site, following aspects should be carefully considered :
Assessment of Resources
Selection of site should be followed by detailed assessment of its resources as listed below :
Preliminary Operations
After selecting a site, a few tillage operations have to be done on the land. These operations improve the physical, chemical and biological conditions of the soil. Some of the main operations are described.
All undesirable vegetation in the field such as trees, shrubs, bushes, grasses and parasitic plants should be cleared off.
It is highly advantageous to plough or dig the land to loosen the compactness of soil and to bury leaves and other plant residues. It will make soil conditions more favourable to plant growth by improving the water holding capacity of the soil.
Levelling involves considerable shifting of soil and, therefore is a relatively expensive process. This is practiced mainly in undulated site. The site is divided into sections and leveled section wise.
Planting system
Commonly, there are five system of orchard planting :
It is the simplest and the most convenient among the planning systems. Trees are set at the corners of a square formed by intersecting lengthwise parallel lines with crosswire lines. In this system, plant to plant distance is same as row to row distance.
This method is similar in all respects to square system except that plant to plant distance is less than row to row spacing.
The quincunx or diagonal system is same as square system, but with addition of a tree in the centre of each square. In this case the number of trees are almost double of that in square system. The central tree is usually not a permanent tree and is planted just to fill the central place to serve as an additional source of income till the main trees come into bearing.
The hexagonal system is also known as equilateral triangle system as the trees are planted at the corners of equilateral triangles. In this system, the distance between the rows is 86 percent of plant to plant distance.
Contour is an imaginary line across a slope joining the points at same elevation. The system is only meant for hilly tracts. Contour lines are marked using a dumpy level or any other suitable instrument and trees are planted on them at the required distance. This controls the soil erosion.
Planting
The season of planting varies with different fruits and local conditions. In India, there are two season of planting : (1) monsoon (June to August), and (ii) spring (February to March).
The monsoon season is considered to be ideal time for planting evergreen fruits trees like citrus, mango, guava etc. However if irrigation is assured, then spring season is the best time for planting.
Quality of the produce and the ultimate success of the orchard depend upon the planting material selected at the time of establishment of the orchard. The following point should be considered while selecting plant material :
The planting distance (space between plant to plant) varies with kind of fruit trees, size at maturity, fertility of soil, rainfall or availability of irrigation water and other agro climatic factors.
For proper development and better yield, the fruit trees must be spaced accurately. The two important factors which determine the spacing of fruit plants are : i) natural habit of the plant, and ii) soild and climatic conditions.
Trees with a naturally big spread such as mango, jackfruit and litchi need larger space than trees such as orange, guava, peaches and plum. Grafted or budded trees in general being smaller than trees raised from seeds require less spacing. Trees of the same kind grow better and bigger in a favourable agro-climatic and soil conditions than the trees growing in unfavourable conditions. The former obviously require more spacing than the latter. The following table provides the normal planting distance for the most common fruit trees.
Planting distance for common fruit trees
Name |
Distance (metres) |
Almond |
6 – 8 |
Apricot |
6 - 8 |
Apple |
8 - 9 |
Avocado |
8 - 9 |
Banana |
1 – 2.5 |
Ber |
11 - 12 |
Cashew nut |
7 - 8 |
Cherry |
10 – 12 |
Custard apple |
5 - 6 |
Date palm |
11 - 12 |
Fig |
3 – 4.5 |
Grape |
2.5 - 4 |
Grape Fruit |
6 - 8 |
Guava |
6 - 8 |
Hazel nut |
2 - 3 |
Jackfruit |
10 - 12 |
Jamun |
10 - 12 |
karonda |
2 - 3 |
Lemon |
5 - 6 |
Litchi |
10 - 12 |
Mandarin |
4.5 - 6 |
Mango |
12 |
Papaya |
2.5 - 3 |
Passion fruit |
3 - 4 |
Peach |
6 - 8 |
Pear |
4 - 5 |
Pineapple |
1 - 2 |
Plum |
5 - 6 |
Pomegranate |
5 - 6 |
Strawberry |
0.8-1.0 |
Sweet orange |
6 - 8 |
Walnut |
12 |
The distances are determined based on the crown’s growth of various fruit trees under normal soil and climatic conditions. The branches of trees when fully grown should not overlap each other. Hence, the tree to tree spacing is equal to the diameter of the crown of a full grown tree.
The plot where the trees are to be planted should be laid out by marking the position of fruit trees by fixing pegs.
If planting is to be done at the onset of monsoon, the pits should be preferably dug during the end of previous monsoon or in winter. In heavy rainfalls, planting can be done after the monsoon so that the young plants are not affected by water-logging.
Size of the pit varies with the root system of the fruit plants. In general, pits having 1 x 1 x 1 metre size are dug for planting of fruit trees. These pits are exposed to sunlight for 15 days. The pits are then filled with a mixture of soil and well prepared farmyard manure.
Farmyard manure should be well decomposed. A mixture of three baskets of farm yard manure, on basket of sand and enough top soil dug out from the pit should be used to fill two third of the pit. This mixture can be added with 50g of BHC (10%) dust and 250g of single superphosphate. Mix the entire material thoroughly and fill 2 / 3 of the pit.
The planting, with its root intact within the mud ball, should be placed in the middle of the pit. Soil should be put in the pit from all sides making it a little higher than ground level. While planting, care should be taken to keep the graft or land joint well above the surface of the soil. The plant should be planted as deep as they stood in the nursery. For better contact of root with the soil around, the soil should be pressed well and irrigated immediately. The plant should be staked with any support to protect them from being damanged by strong winds.
Plant Care
After planting, the fruit grower has to ensure the optimum growth of saplings. He should pay attention to soil management, intercropping, water management, manuring, intercultural operations and horticultural practices such as pruning and training.
Soil management consist mainly of the conservation of soil, moisture, and fertility and improvement of the physical, chemical and biological properties of soil. These are achieved easily by deep tillage and manuring before every monsoon during the first five years of plantation.
Following are the agronomic practices which should be carried out in an orchard till it is established.
Any crop grown (preferably legumes) in between the planted saplings to form a cover for the soil is called cover crop. It preserves soil and moisture, suppresses weeds and supplies organic materials to the soil.
While the trees the young and non bearing, they do not need all the ground space in the orchard. Therefore, it is advantageous to grow seasonal crops between rows of fruits trees. Intercropping has several advantages :
Addition of green leaves and succulent stems help to increase the soil fertility. This may be carried out either by ploughing or by incorporating into the soil green manure crops grown in the orchard or bought from outside.
If none of the above mentioned agronomic practices are followed weeding may be necessary. However, the time and frequency of weeding depends on the extent and intensity of weed growth.
Water management here means making available sufficient quantity of water to the saplings or draining out the excess water till the saplings are well established.
Plants get water mainly through irrigation or by water conservation practices. Whereas excess of water can be drained out by adopting any of the methods of drainage, the frequency of irrigation and the quantity of water given during each irrigation depends on methods of irrigation , type of soil, size of the plant and atmospheric condition including rainfall. If there is water scarcity, earthen pot irrigation is the most suitable method for saplings.
Regular manuring and fertilization is necessary for the proper growth of saplings. Their quantity, methods and times of application vary with the kinds of fruits trees and the level of soil fertility. Generally, these are applied at the beginning and end of rainy season.
Saplings need special protection from possible attach of pests and diseases till they are established. The grower must acquire sufficient knowledge about the common pests and diseases of the type of trees he / she grows and take preventive measure.
The fruit trees should be trained into a proper shape and size according to their types and varities during the first few years of plantation. Pruning means cutting off branches at appropriate positions to encourage regrowth and fruiting or to remove unwanted portions of a plant.
Despite the best care given to the saplings in the orchard, a few of them are likely to die due to various reasons in the first year and gaps occur in the rows. These gaps should be filled at the end of first year with plants of the same age and variety. Gaps should be filled even at the end of the second year if they occur and make sure that the orchard is having sufficient number of trees.
Time of flowering and fruiting varies with the kinds of fruits trees, their varities and the method of propogation adopted. Vegetatively propogated trees start bearing the second year onwards, whereas trees from seed take longer period. No fruit tree should be allowed by flower and fruit before it has grown to sufficient size and strength. Till then al the flowers should be removed as soon as they appear. Generally fruiting should be allowed only after 5-6 years of plantation. Special care is needed for trees during the firest few years of fruiting.