Pruning - GG-ABC

Pruning can have a dramatic impact on how trees respond to gravity, wind, and ice storms. Our data generated from a wind machine producing up to 120 mph winds shows that structural pruning designed to reduce growth rate and weight on co-dominant limbs is the most effective method of minimizing damage from storms. First we will learn how branches develop strong connections to the trunk, and what makes them weak. Then we will show details on how trees fail and why and how to prevent it. We will teach you what to look for when evaluating trees for potential failure and how to treat these trees. Pruning will be conducted on young and medium-aged trees live on video and in slides showing some tree’s response to pruning over a 20-year period!  Although many professionals support the ANSI pruning standards that describe pruning types, there are many variations of pruning applied in the landscape. We will thoroughly decipher thinning, reduction, raising and structural pruning. You will go home with a new understanding of how and why we prune trees, and how to apply it to most real life situations. This presentation will help you provide the very latest in tree health care to your customers including research so new it’s not yet published.

Topics covered will include: how trees are put together and how they fall apart, branch union morphology and function, locating the collar, tree energy balance and biology as it relates to pruning, differentiating among the three major pruning cut types, implications of not structurally pruning, how to avoid making large pruning cuts, training young and medium-aged trees for sustainability, restoring and maintaining old mature trees.