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Tree Trimming 101 – The Unnecessary Branches

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Tree trimming is an important activity for tree growers and professionals across the globe. Tree trimming is the method of felling/trimming in forestry-oriented applications such as felling, pruning, and trimming on already established landscapes. Park trees, road frontages, lawn grass, and vegetation all are in the middle of focus for the tree trimming industry. In North America, tree trimming has become almost a standard yard maintenance practice and many cities/counties provide designated staff to trim trees in the neighborhood. However, in less populated areas tree trimming may not be as routine or well regulated.

One key to good tree trimming is knowing the type of trees you have. You’ll want to know the difference between conifers and ficus and between spruces and sycamore. Sycamore trees have curly leaves and can become susceptible to disease, so it’s best to prune them in the spring when new growth is abundant. Ficus trees are stiff, straight with well-defined foliage and disease resistant so it’s a good idea to trim them in the late winter or early spring when they’re in the dormancy stage of growth.

Careful tree trimming also helps prevent tree diseases. Leaf spot, scale, and fungus can all affect your trees and you don’t want any of these to affect your fruit bearing or leafing trees. Leaf spot is a patchy yellow appearance on the leaves that’s caused by a fungus that eats the sapwood from the tree. Scale causes a hard, scaly spots that will cause damage to the bark and can spread rapidly to other branches.

Pruning back mature stems can be a good practice for tree trimming and prevents injury to young growing branches. Most homeowners prefer prune back flowering buds since they can sometimes get overgrown due to too many leaves on the stem. It’s a good practice to wait until the flowering buds have flowered completely before removing them. This is especially true for trees with narrow strapping stems like maple trees. The reason is that young shoots are prone to breaking off at the tip and creating an irregular shape at the top of the stems. Removing these flowering buds also deters deer and rodent activity near the tree.

If you live on or near a busy road, there is another tree trimming technique you should know about. While it doesn’t always prevent branches from breaking off or hurting passersby, it does help to keep traffic moving. By slowing traffic down, the risk of accident will be reduced.

Some people opt for tree trimming without the use of certified Tree Service San Diego. However, not all of these methods are safe. Trimming back wild trees can be dangerous because it exposes you and your companions to potentially serious injury. If you’re going to try it yourself, it’s important to research how to remove sick or dead branches safely and without harming yourself.

If you have a tree pruned your own, be sure to file or filet your limbs after you trim them. The best thing to do is to leave enough material on the stem so that the next guy (or gal) can take it down. This will ensure there is nothing sharp on the ends, which could lead to nasty cuts on limbs.

A popular alternative to the old tree trimming practice of felling trees in the winter months is to “chop them up” right before spring. You do this by manually trimming out unwanted branches. This can be done using a mower or a handsaw. This is an unnecessary branch removal technique because limbs that grow back will be weaker than those removed. This technique tends to leave trees with frail branches and undesirable shape after the winter.