This site suggests winter or early spring pruning to maintain a clear shoot leader on young trees.

https://plants.usda.gov › pdfPDF

FIREBERRY HAWTHORN - USDA Plants Database

If anyone knows different, please post.

:-)

How low is the fork? A hawthorn is never going to be a very neat tree. Any chance of a photo?

My thoughts were that if I pruned this fall, the wound would begin to heal before winter and that may be advantageous for the plant?

The fork is 1 ft from the bottom.

I'm not concerned at all about neatness. The trunk shows signs of being crushed at some point earlier in life so was bent over and regrew upward, then forked. But I'm good with that, in fact, I may keep the more crooked of the codominate leaders just for that reason. :-)

My pc is still in the shop so my good pictures are indisposed at this time.

Here's one I took yesterday after I put the winter protection on. The left side is straighter but has more side branches to trim. The right is a little taller but oh so much more character. :-)

Hi Bill, as I understand it, the problem with fall pruning can be ’Indian Summer’. If it gets warm, might you have new growth that then freezes off? No expert here, just what I’ve heard.

IGG, This native stuff doesn't wake up easily once it's dormant, so I'll wait until then. One or two cuts generally won't spur new growth anyways. Aggressive pruning early Fall might.

The following picture shows how the 2 competing leaders come back together about a foot above the fork, with both crowns trying to occupy the same space.

So I think the tree will develop better by removing one. That will still only leave about 2 ft of clear trunk overall.

I have larger specimens growing wild in my forest that are 20 ft tall with 6ft trunks of ~4" caliper but not pretty competing for sun. This tree will have full sun so hopes will be to eventually groom a wide, rounded crown with 3-4 ft of gnarly trunk. :-)

A couple of nights of 27f & 25f ended our growing season.

A tough choice but the taller of the two leaders had the best form, needing no other pruning at this time. One cut & done.

And now you wait. To the human eye — well, at least this human eye — that is aesthetically painful, but I understand the logic of your decision. It will be interesting to see it develop in five year increments. i hope you’ll share pictures. :)

Thanks Bob!

And being it's a several year old plant already and more of an ornamental or accent tree, it shouldn't take long for a display of flowers in the spring and red fruits in the summer to start looking good. It's been in the ground since 9/6 and 15 ft. out from the br window is some of the deepest and best top soil on the place so it should do well. 8^)

6-10-22

Just a picture to show the plant is healthy and growing vigorously. No blooms this year as expected.

6-13-23:

Still no blooms. Good growth.

That's very nice maackia. All that I have seen flower profusely, leading me to choose this plant over a flowering crab. :-)

With mine being hand dug from the deep woods and 12 species native to Minnesota with some of them possibly expatriated, there's only 4 having any documentation that I can find that exist here, I believe mine to be C. chrysocarpa, 'Fireberry'.

Even though I notice a couple of compound thorns on my Crataegus, which most documentation say are absent on 'FireBerry', I can't find any other Crataegus, native to MN, with compound thorns that matches mine. One possibility is that mine is a natural hybrid.

8-1-2023:

I like how the colors turned out, dark thorns with light branches.

9-20-2021 original thread date.

Today: 8-18-2023: seasonal update!

36" new growth on main leader. 72" total height.

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5-15-25:

First flowers on the Crataegus.

Just thought you might be interested to see our native hawthorn, C. monogyna, in flower at the moment. It's thorny but nothing like as vicious as crus-galli.

Very nice!

When mine gets that big it will be touching the bedroom window. :-)

Turns out, we'll see some 'Thorn Apples' this season. ;-)

8-10-2025:

Been one of those seasons.

Just about the time it begins to get dry, it rains again!

Fire Berry:

The hot, humid, and wet conditions have done a number on the C. crus-galli fruit.

Ugh!

Hope you don't have any apple growers around there. At least not any you want to stay friends with. The tree maybe could use more air circulation. A thinning of branches could help.

Your yard looks more woodsy than mine so could be another reason for the infestation.

It has been very humid here, more Atlanta than Minneapolis. I’m hoping this is a one off, but if I see more of the same than I may have a decision to make. There is a cluster of orchards about six miles north if me. Now I have ethics to consider?

How's your Junipers?

I would think there would be signs of CAR on those too.

Orchards 6 miles aways wouldn't be an issue. Maybe a next-door or few doors down neighbor.

I've had a couple gelatinous little octopuses on red cedar, a time or two when I lived out in the country but had apples on trees 50 ft a ways that showed a slight scabby look on the some of outer skin by Fall but were still fine for domestic uses.

Your occurrence of CAR is 'Shock and Awe'!