Wanted to share some notching results from this year. After reading your comments here and watching an Australian youtube on the topic (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tf8vYRV_Z0A), I finally had the courage to do some heavy notching this winter: (1) to promote low, trunk branching on a spindly damson plum, and (2)  to see how figs would react to notching.

I was really surprised by just how effective notching was.  This is the 2nd year the plum has lived potted at my house while I wait for a place to put it. Last year, there was only top growth with zero budding on the lower trunk. This winter (late February) I notched with a chunky serrated bread knife (about 5mm above node) nearly every trunk node, and this spring about 80% of notched nodes are budding out--some as low as 8 inches above the soil line (just above the graft).

With figs in the past, plants that were top pruned tended to bud out from the 2-3 nodes below the pruning cut, but when lightly scoring above lower node with a box knife, again about 80% of scored nodes are budding out (some very low on the trunk) while unscored nodes tended to NOT bud out. Pretty satisfying results.  Again, all cuts were made in late Feb. and there was just a tiny bit of latex leak from the scores. The scoring did not have any negative results that I encountered.

In the case of an unpruned HC that had grown top-heavy, notching above a lower node yielded budding while other lower nodes not notched did not bud. 

Hope some with spindly plants will find this useful to encourage lower growth. It appears scoring in conjunction with tipping and/or pruning was significantly more useful than tipping/pruning alone.

Have a great weekend, folks.
         

That's great. Can the notching be done only in February, or any time?

Congratulations on a good job ! !! I would select the ones you want to keep a get rid of the rest as soon as possible
Mario

Very cool... So the notching doesn't have to go all around the trunk right?

I'm not a pro, Valerie, but from reading, it seems late winter and throughout spring is ideal as the plant is still in its growth spurt. This article also talk about other timing and uses for scoring in apple trees: http://www.homeorchardsociety.org/growfruit/trees/scoring-and-notching-a-method-in-tree-training/

Great information!  Thanks for sharing!

You learn something new every day.

Thanks for the information. I will try this on some of my trees.

I wonder if this will work on cuttings? I have lots of cuttings with great roots but no leaves on some of them. Perhaps I'll try this on some of the cuttings to see if it will promote new leaves.

It really work for me. My Noire de caromb has a new branch when I applied notching. Less than 2 weeks. This is a really amazing technique

Would notching induce bud growth above s node where there isn't currently a bud? In other words, can you use notching to produce buds or is it only effective on an existing bud? 😛

I'm going to try this on a graft that hasn't budded out yet after 9 weeks but still looks healthy.

figgi11,

I believe the notching only works to promote the development of a bud that it's already there. You can't "make" new buds with this technique.


laeotis,

I tried notching on chip buds that were grafted quite low and to older branches (2 years old) - i usually try to use one year old branches to serve as rootstocks.
They stayed dormant several weeks (and months) after grafting. I didn't had much luck with most of them.  

I found out that, if they are in good shape and the cambiums have fused, sooner or later they will bud out. You may have to reduce the apical dominance of what's above them (don't over do it, or the fig tree may remove all sap from the branch)

Here's a bud that stayed dormant for almost 2 years (it was grafted in August 2015), even after heavy notching above it. It ignored it completely and this spring it surprised me. 

Hi,
This time of year, if you don't care for the brebas at the top of the stems, and are more into getting branching, I would cut the top of all the stems on that tree.
removing the top buds will be more effective at promoting the buds underneath . I have some stems that are brown near the top - those tops are toast - on most, 3 or 4 buds are now
appearing and swelling to replace the lost top bud .