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<pre>Dear Olive Friends - I've written to the group previously and would like to
thank you for your help. I'm asking for your input once again.

A friend and I are proposing (to the owner of the grove) to restore olive
production of an old stand of Picholine trees in the Napa Valley. We believe
the trees were planted around 100 years ago and know, from the owner, that
they have not been maintained in any way for at least 40 years. Currently the
trees are 10-13 meters high, and are not bearing any olives.

Neither my friend or I have worked with olives previously. However, after
reading (Stan Kalis and Brian Chatterton) about old grove restoration for
practical hand harvesting, we pruned 2 "demonstration" trees for the owner.
We removed all suckers and inner branches, and trying to get a vase shape,
left 3 or 4 outer branches, which we cut off at about 3 meters. This
removed all branches with leaves. We expect to get vegetative growth next
year, and flowers and fruit in two years.

Here's the rub. An influential friend of the owner has told the owner. "On
general principle, I am discouraging "flat-topping" the olive trees they
want to work with. There is no horticultural need to prune them that way;
more importantly, it is bad to prune out more than 25% of the growth @ any
given time." The person who made the statement works a lot with plants and
trees, but as far as I know has no direct experience with olives. My
question to all of you is: Are her concerns valid, and is there a better way
to restore these old trees.

Thanks,

Alan Friedman
</pre>
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