On Mon, 3 Aug 2015 17:11:14 -0400, Dave Smith
> wrote:

>On 2015-08-03 3:34 PM, Ed Pawlowski wrote:
>> On 8/2/2015 10:42 PM, Nancy Young wrote:
>>
>>> My question is this, do you all prune your tomato vines? I just
>>> put square wire cages around them and let them go. I've heard
>>> of people pruning them so they grow more tomatoes on more linear
>>> vines.
>>
>> Sometimes I do. Rather than put the energy into growing leaves, it is
>> supposed to put that energy into the fruit. Personally, I've not seen a
>> real difference.
>
>?? What energy? The plant gets its energy from the sun. The leaves are
>what absorb the sun's rays and use it to transform the other nutrients
>to a form of energy the plant can use.

I know for a fact that the technique works on tomatoes and other crops
as well (assuming we're talking about thinning out shoots and fruiting
buds). Yes, the leaves provide energy from the sun, but the plants
still expends a lot of energy growing lots of fruit, rather than
fewer, better ones where the smaller/inferior ones have been removed.
Same with fruit trees.