3 Things to Know Before You Prune

The more you know about how your tree lives and grows, the better you’ll be able to take care of it. Pruning is something we do to trees for many different reasons. Though there is a lot more to the subject, here are a few tips to cover 3 common mistakes I run across the most which are easily avoided.

1: Make proper cuts! The finished cut should be smooth, and just outside of the branch collar*, or a union. Don’t leave long stubs.

2: Don’t over do it. Especially in fully mature trees where the pruning “dose**” can be 10% of the canopy or less. If your tree needs a lot of pruning, spread it over more than one year.

3: Don’t chop the ends off “needle tree***” branches. Although some tolerate this kind of trimming, on most the branch will die back to the next union or all the way back to the trunk…

Again, these are just a few highlights. There is so much more to proper trimming and pruning, after reading entire books on the subject I still have many questions. If your going to do it yourself learn what you can, and observe your tree. If in doubt, your local arborist is happy to help, just remember that we have to make a living as well. Though we give a lot of free advice please don’t exhaust our free consultation resources ;).

*Branch “collar”, is the flare where the branch and trunk meet. This part of the tree has different growth characteristics than the bark around it. It heals across the wound from branch removal much quicker than if the branch is cut elsewhere.

**Pruning Dose, How much you take off. On some established young trees this can be close to 30%, but age, health, and species all affect how much can safely be removed. Some trees should only have dead, damaged, or diseased parts removed with the rest of the canopy left intact.

***Needle trees, There is pruning that can be done on these, but they are a little more touchy. Spruce, Pine and Fir act very differently than Cedar and Yew. That is a topic for a longer article.