Pruning is an important part of keeping your Arbequina olive tree in top shape – but the good news is that olive trees, especially Arbequinas, are pretty easygoing about it. In fact, Arbequina olives don’t require heavy pruning to produce fruit. They naturally grow into a lovely form on their own. However, a bit of smart trimming each year can improve sunlight penetration, control the size, and encourage better yields. This guide will walk you through the why, when, and how of pruning your Arbequina olive tree, whether it’s planted in the ground or living in a pot.
Why Prune Your Olive Tree?
Understanding the purpose of pruning helps you prune correctly. Here are the main reasons we prune Arbequina olive trees:
- Shape and Size Control: In a backyard or container, you likely don’t want your olive tree getting too big or unruly. Pruning helps maintain a desirable size and an attractive shape (you might want a more tree-like form or a shrubby form, depending on your preference).
- Increase Sunlight and Airflow: Olive trees fruit on the previous year’s growth, and those branches produce best when they get plenty of sun. By thinning out a dense canopy, you let sunlight reach inner branches and improve airflow which reduces disease risk. An open, airy canopy also helps all those olive blossoms get good pollination (wind can flow through, carrying pollen).
- Remove Weak or Problem Wood: Cutting out dead, damaged, or diseased branches keeps the tree healthy overall. Also, removing very thin, weak shoots and any suckers (shoots from the base) allows the tree to direct its energy to strong branches that will bear fruit.
- Encourage New Fruitful Growth: While olives can bear for many years on older branches, a supply of fresh growing shoots is vital for consistent production. Light pruning stimulates new growth that will become the next fruiting wood in subsequent seasons.
- Ease of Harvest and Maintenance: A well-pruned tree is easier to harvest from (imagine an olive tree pruned short enough that you can pick olives without a very tall ladder). It’s also easier to spray or cover if needed, and just generally more accessible.
Think of pruning as guiding your olive tree rather than forcing it. Arbequinas are quite forgiving – they can even come back from a hard prune if you ever really needed to cut one back drastically. But in most cases, a moderate annual prune will yield the best results.
When to Prune an Arbequina Olive Tree
Timing matters. The ideal pruning time for olives (and Arbequinas in particular) is late winter to early spring. Here’s why:
- The tree is just about to ramp up growth for the new season, so cuts will heal quickly as the sap flow increases.
- You avoid pruning in autumn/early winter, which could stimulate new growth that then gets hit by frost.
- By late winter, you can see what wood is clearly dead from any winter damage and remove it.
- Crucially, you want to prune before or just as the tree begins to flower in spring. Arbequinas usually bloom in mid to late spring (with tiny white flowers). Pruning just before this means you aren’t cutting off too many of the flower buds that will become olives. If you prune much later, you risk removing a lot of potential fruit.
In many regions, this late winter/early spring window corresponds to February or March (maybe early April in cooler climates). Essentially, once the hardest frosts are over but before full-on spring growth, that’s your moment.
What if you missed that window? You can still do light pruning in summer if needed (for example, to remove a broken branch or tame an overly vigorous shoot), but avoid major pruning in late summer/fall. If you prune very late in the season, any new growth that results might not harden off before cold weather.
For potted olive trees that you bring indoors, you might do a small prune in fall before bringing it inside, mostly for size management. But save the heavier pruning for late winter as well, even if the tree is indoors – the tree will respond to lengthening days and be ready to grow come spring.
Tools and Preparation
Pruning olives doesn’t require fancy equipment, but make sure you have:
- Sharp Bypass Pruners: For small twigs and branches up to maybe 1/2 inch thick. Bypass pruners (the scissor-like kind, not anvil type) make clean cuts that heal better.
- Loppers: Long-handled loppers give more leverage for branches around 1/2 inch to 1-2 inches thick.
- Pruning Saw: If you have an older olive tree with some thick limbs to remove, a small pruning saw is useful for branches thicker than ~2 inches.
- Gloves and Safety Glasses: Olive wood isn’t very thorny (unlike some citrus, etc.), but old wood can be rough. Wear gloves to protect your hands. Glasses or safety goggles are smart if you’re cutting above eye level or dealing with any branches that might snap back.
- Cleaning Supplies: It’s good practice to wipe your pruner blades with rubbing alcohol or a 10% bleach solution before you start, especially if the tree had any sign of disease. Also clean between trees if pruning multiple plants, to avoid potentially spreading diseases like olive knot.
Approach the tree and give it a once-over before cutting anything. Identify branches that stand out as candidates: dead wood (brittle, no leaves, possibly dark and dry), criss-crossing branches, very low suckers, or any tall shoots far above the rest (if you want to maintain a shorter form).
How to Prune: Step-by-Step
Let’s prune! Here are the steps and tips to follow for a typical pruning session:
1. Remove Dead, Diseased, or Damaged Wood: Start with the obvious cuts. Any branch that is clearly dead (scrape the bark – if it’s brown underneath instead of green, it’s dead) should come off. Cut it back to its point of origin – either to the trunk or to a living lateral branch. If you see any branch with disease (like oozing or odd bumps that might indicate olive knot, or a branch that died back due to cold), prune those out well below the affected area. Also cut off any broken branches from wind or weight of fruit. This “cleanup” step already improves the tree and prevents problems from spreading.
2. Remove Suckers and Water Sprouts: Suckers are those shoots that come up from the base or roots of the tree. Unless you want your tree to have multiple trunks, remove suckers flush at the base. They steal energy and won’t bear fruit for a long time. Water sprouts are vigorous, perfectly vertical shoots that often appear along branches or from the trunk (usually as a response if the tree was heavily pruned previously or had excess nitrogen). These generally don’t produce fruit and just clutter the canopy. Cut water sprouts off at their base (they can be skinny but numerous). Sometimes water sprouts can be trained to replace a branch if needed, but usually on a small Arbequina you won’t need them.
3. Thin the Canopy (if needed): Step back and look at the overall density of the tree. Arbequinas can develop a dense crown of foliage. We want some light to reach inside. Identify a few branches in the interior that are overcrowding or crossing others. Remove or shorten them. The classic guidance for fruit trees is to allow enough space for a little bird to fly through the branches. For olives, you don’t want it too open (they naturally have a slightly bushy look), but definitely if branches are rubbing or densely packed, thin them out. Always prune back to a branch junction or a bud that’s facing the direction you want new growth to go. For example, if removing a branch, cut it at the point where it meets a larger branch or trunk. If shortening a branch, cut just above a bud or smaller branch that points outward (so the new growth goes that way, opening the canopy).
4. Manage Height and Shape: Decide how tall and wide you want your tree. If some branches are far taller than the rest of the canopy, you can shorten them to create a more uniform height. Cut just above a lateral branch so that lateral takes over as the “new tip.” For width, if there are branches dragging the ground or sticking out into a walkway, feel free to shorten those. Arbequinas often have a naturally umbrella-like shape. You can enhance this by removing very low branches that might droop to the ground when laden with fruit, and focusing growth into the canopy above. Many people train their olive to have a short trunk (maybe 2-3 feet tall) and then a rounded head; to do this, remove the lowest few branches and any new ones that try to emerge low on the trunk over time.
5. Consider Fruiting Wood: Since olives fruit on last year’s growth, you generally don’t want to whack off every branch that had olives last season. Those can produce again or have side shoots that will produce. What you can do is shorten some of last year’s fruiting branches to encourage side branching. When you cut a branch tip, it usually stimulates buds below to push out new shoots. Those new shoots will be next year’s fruit bearers. So if you have, say, a long branch that fruited out at the ends, you might cut a few inches off that tip. That way, you refresh that branch with new laterals. But don’t trim all fruiting branch tips – leave some untouched so you still get some fruit the next season. It’s a balance: you’re always thinking about this season’s olives vs. next season’s. A light annual prune tends to even it out so you get consistent crops.
6. Pruning Potted Arbequinas: For container olive trees, the principles are the same, but you might prune more often to keep them small. Feel free to trim a potted Arbequina like you would a large bonsai or topiary if you desire – they can handle it. You might snip a little here and there throughout the growing season just to keep shape. Typically, on a potted tree you’d remove suckers, thin out a bit, and keep it at whatever height is manageable for your indoor/outdoor space. Potted olives sometimes shoot up a long vertical branch; you can cut those back pretty hard to encourage side growth and a fuller look.
7. After Pruning Care: Olives don’t usually need anything special after pruning. They may respond with a flush of new growth as the weather warms. If you made any large cuts (thicker than say 1 inch diameter), you might consider applying a tree wound paint or sealer if your area is known for olive knot (a bacterial disease that can enter cuts in wet weather). However, most of the time, leaving cuts unsealed is fine – they will dry and callus naturally. Just avoid pruning right before a long rainy period to minimize infection risk.
Throughout the pruning process, step back frequently and look at the tree’s shape. Prune a little at a time – you can’t put a branch back once it’s cut! Aim for a balanced look, not lopsided. Also, ensure you don’t remove too much. As a guideline, try not to remove more than about 20-25% of the tree’s canopy in a single year. Taking off too much can stress the tree and lead to a big growth of water sprouts as the tree tries to compensate.
What Does a Well-Pruned Arbequina Look Like?
By the end of your pruning session, your Arbequina olive tree should still look largely like itself – just a bit tidier. Here’s what you might notice:
- The center of the tree has some open space where sunlight can filter through.
- The overall height is within your desired range, with no awkwardly long shoots way above the others.
- The lower part of the tree is free of suckers and perhaps you’ve lifted the canopy slightly by removing very low drooping branches (if it was an issue).
- The tree still has plenty of small lateral branches – you didn’t strip it bare of all its minor twigs. Olive trees often look a bit sparse right after pruning since you removed some dense inner foliage, but they should still have a framework of branches intact with buds that will grow.
- No branch is touching or rubbing another; each has its own space to grow.
- The shape might be vase-like (with an open center), or a rounded dome, depending on your style. There’s no single “correct” shape for an olive – some prune olives into a traditional wine-glass shape (open center), others let them be more tree-like with a central leader. Arbequinas naturally tend to a bushy shape, but you can prune toward either form.
How Olives Respond to Pruning
It’s worth noting that olive trees, Arbequinas included, have a strong ability to bounce back. If you ever make a mistake and cut a bit too much, the tree will likely produce new shoots to replace what was lost. In fact, sometimes older olive trees are “rejuvenation pruned” by cutting them nearly to stumps, and they resprout vigorously from old wood. You won’t be doing that to your garden tree unless absolutely necessary, but it’s reassuring that your pruning work is unlikely to seriously harm the tree.
After pruning in spring, you should see new growth commence within weeks as the weather warms. Tiny buds along the branches you left will swell and shoot out new leaves and twigs. If your timing was right, the tree will still bloom around its normal time. If you pruned a bit late and removed some flower buds, you might see slightly fewer flowers/olives this year, but it will catch up next year.
One thing to keep in mind: if your olive was neglected and never pruned for many years, the first time you prune it might cause it to respond with a lot of vigorous new shoots (water sprouts). Don’t be discouraged – that is the tree having a growth party due to sudden sunlight reaching old wood. Just plan to thin those out the next year, selecting a few to keep as new fruiting wood and removing the rest. With consistent, lighter pruning each year, you avoid those dramatic flushes and keep things balanced.
Special Cases and Tips
- Older Trees: If your Arbequina is mature and has a thick trunk, you might need to saw off a couple thicker limbs as it ages (for example, limbs that have gotten too low or perhaps one that is too crowded). Do so carefully and make clean cuts. If removing a large limb, cut in sections to avoid tearing bark – cut off a portion of the branch a foot or two out, then make a final cut closer to the trunk so it doesn’t snap and strip bark. An old olive can handle losing a big branch or two, but try not to remove large branches all in one year if you can spread it out.
- Hedge or Screening: Some people plant olives as a hedge or privacy screen and may want a denser form. In this case, you’ll actually prune more like you would a hedge: lightly but frequently tip-trimming to encourage bushiness. Arbequinas can be maintained as an informal hedge a few feet thick. Just note, heavy formal shearing might reduce fruit since you’re constantly cutting off new growth. But if privacy is more important than olives, you can prune accordingly.
- After Harvest Pruning: Another acceptable time to do a light prune is right after harvest in late fall, especially in very mild climates where the tree doesn’t face a hard winter. Some olive growers will prune post-harvest to shape the tree, then do minor touch-ups in spring. If you go this route, be cautious not to stimulate late-season growth if frost is a risk, and keep cuts minimal. For backyard growers, sticking to spring pruning is simpler.
- Watch for Olive Knot: If you live in an area where the bacterial disease olive knot is present, try to prune during dry weather and sterilize tools between cuts. Olive knot causes galls on branches and can enter through pruning wounds especially in wet conditions. Sterilizing pruners with alcohol between each major cut can prevent inadvertently spreading it if it’s in your tree. Again, this is usually a concern in humid, coastal olive-growing regions. Most home growers won’t encounter it, but it’s good to be aware.
A Little Pruning Goes a Long Way
Pruning an Arbequina olive tree is more of an art than a strict science, but it’s an easy art to learn. These trees respond well and won’t punish you for imperfect cuts. By dedicating a bit of time each year to trim and shape your tree, you’ll keep it in optimal health and make your life easier when it comes to maintenance and harvesting.
After pruning, you can look forward to a flush of new growth and, with any luck, clusters of flowers that will become your next crop of olives. The tree will likely look happier too – with more light reaching its interior, you might notice improved vigor.
Remember that each tree is a little different. Pay attention to how your particular olive reacts year to year and adjust your pruning approach accordingly. Maybe it hardly needed anything one year, or maybe one side grows more than the other and needs extra trimming. Over time, you’ll become very attuned to your tree’s needs.
So grab those pruners and approach your Arbequina with confidence. A few thoughtful cuts and you’ll have a beautifully shaped olive tree that’s primed for fruitful production and ornamental appeal. Plus, pruning is a great way to bond with your tree (yes, talking to it while pruning is totally allowed!). Here’s to many years of enjoyable gardening with your well-pruned Arbequina olive tree.