Pruning trees can be daunting if you don’t know how much to trim off or when to make cuts to manage unruly growth.

In some cases, even the smallest trimming errors can cause unnecessary tree stress and an ugly mess. While most trees are tough and often recover after a botched pruning job, some don’t.

If you don’t want to hurt your trees, tree services providers advise you to avoid pruning blunders and instead learn how to prune properly. To help you out, here are the best practices when pruning the trees:

Don’t cut buds.

The most common mistake people make when pruning trees is cutting off budding buds. It does not hurt the tree in the long run, but the effects are obvious for the growing season.

Trees generate flowers and buds at various times of the year and removing the flower buds is not good.

Here’s a general rule of thumb you should observe. If a tree or shrub blooms in the spring or early summer, the flower buds are most likely produced during the previous growth season. You should prune them in spring and summer flowering trees once they bloom.

If a tree flowers in the middle of the summer or fall, it will most likely develop flower buds during the current growing season and can be clipped in early spring. Fruit trees are an exception to this rule. Despite the fact that they bloom in the spring, you should prune most trees in the late winter.

Don’t remove too much growth at once

It’s tempting to prune a massively overgrown tree or shrub all at once. The impulse to shape the tree, blend it with the surrounding landscape, and finish the job can lead to the removal of too much growth at once.

The tree’s branch and root systems are supported by thriving green growth. A significant loss in food-producing green growth has a negative impact on all portions of the tree. Excessive trimming might even end up killing the tree.

To stay on the safe side, never remove over one-third of the tree’s bulk during a growing season when pruning an overgrown tree or shrub.

The best way to go about it is to undertake regular, light pruning. You should remove a small quantity of wood each year rather than a significant amount all at once. This helps to keep the tree’s natural shape and reduces stress.

When pruning, prioritize removing dead, diseased, or damaged branches, followed by selective thinning to improve the tree’s structure.

For most tree species, pruning during the dormant season (winter) reduces stress and helps the tree recuperate better.

Make clean cuts beyond the branch collar, avoid leaving stubs or cutting too close to the trunk, and use proper pruning procedures.

To ensure the tree is pruned appropriately and securely, engage an arborist or tree care specialist.

Avoid topping a tree to reduce height.

Topping is never a suitable approach to pruning trees and is rarely a good way to reduce the size of huge shrubs.

When huge branches are chopped back indiscriminately to lessen their length, new stems grow from buds below the incision.

New growth is often weakly linked to the tree, quickly becoming a threat as each branch grows and becomes more vulnerable to injury.

The best approach to reducing the size of a tree or shrub is by cutting branches back to the adjoining limb in the case of a tree or back to ground level in the case of shrubs.

Another way to reduce the size of a tree is to cut a long branch back to a lateral branch, one-third to one-half the diameter of the branch being removed. This lateral branch quickly takes over the function of the severed branch, resulting in healthy growth.

Make multiple cuts to remove a large branch.

Pruning a huge branch necessitates many cuts to protect you and the tree. As you remove a large branch with a single cut, the branch may move or rotate during the sawing process and fall back on you as it separates from the tree.

Using a single cut on a large branch increases the risk of the to-be-pruned branch ripping off neighboring bark layers and causing damage to the tree.

Use the three-cut pruning procedure for branches greater than 2 inches in diameter.

• The first cut is a 5-inch undercut from the trunk or neighboring branch. Make the undercut halfway down the branch.
• The second cut occurs a few inches beyond the undercut, removing the branch’s weight.
• Finally, the third cut removes the remaining stump.

Remove the stump before the branch collar, the slightly swollen area where the branch connects to the tree. Cut the piece at a 45-degree angle.

Trim the tree at the right time.

It’s tempting to prepare for winter by pruning in late summer or fall. Resist the temptation. This is because late-season pruning might result in a flush of delicate new growth.

The new growth is not resilient enough to resist winter’s freeze-thaw cycles. Decay can set up swiftly, zapping new growth and seeping into surrounding branches.

To avoid this, do not prune after September. By pruning trees and shrubs in late winter, you can get a head start on spring garden duties.

Don’t be in a hurry.

Pruning with skill takes time. Never rush through a trimming job. You will undoubtedly make cuts that will take years to rectify or fail to make required fundamental cuts before it is too late.

To be on the safe side:

1. Start with the easy cuts.
2. Get rid of any dead, sick, or damaged wood.
3. Remove any branches crossing, rubbing against, or growing into one another.

You should then step back and examine the plant from every angle. Reduce the size of the plant by pruning branches to their bases.

Remove branches joined to the trunk at a tight angle while pruning trees; these weak unions are prone to breaking in a storm. Take care to take at most one-third of the plant’s mass.

If you are strapped for time and feel you won’t be available to do the pruning, let an experienced arborist services Kensington provider do the work.