HOW & WHAT TIME TO PRUNE MAPLE TREES

Are you searching for “How & What Time To Prune Maple Trees” while looking for information about how to take care of your trees? This article is designed to help you understand more about pruning, when to do it, and how to get the job done. If you’d rather have us take of the trees in your landscape Phoenix Trim-A-Tree offers Tree Pruning Services. To prune a tree is to remove certain branches and/or stems in order to benefit the entire tree.

WHAT IS THE REASON FOR PRUNING A TREE?

It’s health! Removing dead, diseased, and damaged branches will help in preventing insect and decayed organisms from getting into the tree. In order to increase the amount of air and sunlight so that there will be less problems with diseases put a dense canopy on the tree. In order to eliminate having weak wood and to provide it with more food and water remove suckers and water sprouts. In order to prevent damage that is caused by branches rubbing against one another take out all branches that are crossing one another. As a tree grows older they tend to have weak and/or narrow crotches that split apart, by removing these crotches you will keep the wood from breaking and/or tearing apart.

Take off the co-dominant leaders. The co-dominant leaders will be the two branches that are growing close to the trees top, they grow straight up, becoming equally dominant. If you cut one of them off it will allow the other one to be the dominant branch, preventing branches from splitting apart or from tearing the wood, which is generally a problem under heavy winds.

TREE PRUNING SAFETY

Using the proper pruning procedures will create and maintain a stronger tree structure, also prevents the safety hazards of low growing branches, and also the growths that form and are subject to damage from storms.

HOW DO YOU KNOW WHEN TO PRUNE A TREE?

Branches that are dead, diseased, or damaged needs to be remove as soon as they are noticed. Besides that, pruning is best done in late winter or early spring, right before trees begin to opening up their buds. Many trees, like maple and dogwood, bleeds saps during this time of each year. The bleeding doesn’t cause them any harm. Although pruning can be performed at any time, it is best to avoid do so in extremely hot or cold weather. Tree use up energy during weather that is extremely hot or cold, so if pruning is performed after its leaves has opened make certain that you give them enough time to develop their leaves fully, plus a little extra time for recuperating their energy.

HOW DO YOU GO ABOUT PRUNING A TREE?

To prune your tree corrected you need the right tools and some knowledge about where and how to cut. While safety should always be your first priority the next is knowing where to cut on your tree. Before you start cutting and affecting the future shape, health, and safety of your tree make sure to read this in full. Trees pruned correctly add value to your landscape, while over pruning or removing the wrong areas can ruin the look and structural integrity of your tree. The number one rule before ever making a cut is determining why you are pruning and what part is to be pruned. You need to start out having a plan. Next, you need to figure out what kind of equipment you are going to be using. You will generally be using hand pruners, a pruning saw, and loppers. Hand pruners: There is two different kinds of these, they are the bypass and the anvil. The bypass pruners are like scissors, whereas, there are two sharp blades involved, giving a clean cut.

For the anvil pruners, there is only one sharp blade that cuts against another blade having a flat surface. This crushes the underside tissue of the stem. The hand pruners that are recommended to get a clean cut would be the bypass pruners. Both of these type of pruners is intended to be able to cut wood that is ½ to ¾ an inch in diameter.

• LOPPERS – Loppers come in two different types, the bypass and the anvil. There blades are larger, with longer handles, designed for cutting wood that is ¾ to 1 ½ inches in diameter. A bypass lopper is the one recommended.
• PRUNING SAWS – The older bow saws are now being replaced by the newer tri-edge saws, which folds. These can quickly cut wood as big as 3 inches in diameter.

HOW TO GO ABOUT CUTTING

Pruning itself wounds a tree. But when it is done correctly it can actually help a tree. Of course, if it is incorrectly done the tree can be harmed by it. A couple of examples of incorrect pruning are: flush cuts and when stubs are left behind. Trees are not able to heal their own wounds. If a branch gets cut off, it stays cut off. However, trees are able to seal their wounds, if pruned correctly, what is referred to as a callus can be caused to grow sort of like a doughnut, it starts at the edge and grows inward until it covers the wound (or cut).

There is a boundary of a chemical inside of the tree that forms around the wound and separates it off. This limits potential decay that could occur. Leaving stubs and flush cuts will cause wounds not to be callus over and they cannot be sheltered by being separated by itself. These areas of the tree will merely begin rotting away. In order to prune a branch from a tree’s trunk you need to know where the bark ridge and branch collar is and be able to locate them, these two things are very important. A branch collar is merely where it swells around the base of a branch (Can be viewed in the figure).

You will find the branch bark ridge as a slightly raised area, that is dark, with rough bark which forms at the place where the branch and the truck’s tissue meet. Which are the areas of a tree that contains chemicals to initiate a calluses growth and the separation from the rest of the tree in order to protect its wound that was create from the cut. It is unhealthy to cut into these areas of a tree and needs to be avoided. There will be three cuts necessary if removing a big heavy branch from a tree to keep from tearing the branches collar.

Finally, do not go and ruin a pruning job by putting a coating on the cut using paint, and do not use wood dressing either. Years of research has proven that this does not prevent decay and does nothing to help the wound to close up. The most this will do is promote rot, as it makes the wood stay wet for a longer period of time after a rain shower. Also, you should never take a lot off of the tree at any one time.

MAINTAINING THE NATURAL TREES FORM – Sometimes erratic and vigorous branches will grow, changing the trees growth habits in other branches, resulting in the tree being misshaped. Removing these branches will help to maintain the trees natural form.
SHOULD YOU STIMULATE OR RESTRICT A TREES GROWTH – The sparse areas of a tree can have its growth stimulated by pruning it. If there is an area of the tree that is undesired, its growth can be restricted with pruning.