rockm

"When you're talking about pinching new growth do they mean new buds, or letting it grow for a few leaves then pinching it off. "

There are really a couple of kinds of "pinching new growth" in deciduous trees. The first produces ramification. The other is used to keep the image "in bounds."

The first entails allowing new shoots to grow until they have five six or eighteen new leaves. The object is to get the new shoot to "mature" turn woody, then cut it back to one or two leaves. This stimulates new shoots at the cut site and new leaves. Pruning new immature shoots that have not lignified or turned woody, will NOT pruduce new buds, as the hormones that stimulate new branching aren't present in green tender shoots yet.

The second kind of pinching is done to simply shapren the plant's outline and can be done on green shoots.

Which type you use depends on what you're trying to do with the tree. Older alreay "rammed out" trees need only outline pinching. Newer trees in development require more ramification...