it’s not bad for the tree, necessarily. Most horticultural monstrosities have been selected to basically depend on occasional massive prunings to keep themselves from ripping themselves to shreds over the years.
Even very large species can benefit immensely from an extreme prune, which simulates the kinds of massive catastrophic defoliation evens that happen in nature all the time (fires, hurricanes, tornadoes). It gives the fire branches of the tree more time to and get big with less load to bear.
Sorry this is misinformation. Crape myrtles do tolerate this better than most species but I’ve seen trees killed by this type of “pruning”.
New branches that grow will be poorly attached and become hazards in future years. If the branches are large in diameter or if it’s a species that compartmentalizes decay poorly, then the cut end will rot, often into the main trunk and can cause catastrophic failure in future years. So this is not only ill advised, it’s dangerous to do to a large tree.
There are some cultivars that grow in odd, unstable forms and can benefit from pruning, but that requires carefully guiding the tree’s growth through selective cuts. Not indiscriminate hacking that only makes the problem worse.
Misinformation? As in… you are/ were putting out misinformation?
Its not misinformation whatsoever to suggest that skeleton pruning is an important practice, and what you are doing is deceptive. Skeleton pruning isn’t just a regular horticultural practice, but quite literally, hundreds and thousands of species simply will tear themselves apart without regular, extreme pruning.
We’re not talking about native plants in some particular ecological context where… well… plants just die some times. And thats fine.
We’re talking about human planted, human managed trees, completely outside of the ecological context they evolved in.
These are parking lot trees. We’re talking about species that are expected to survive in the equivalent of an ecological toilet. And yeah, they’ll destroy themselves without regular management. That’s how plants work.
I already provided a source from the ISA, which is the leading authority on this topic. Please provide a source to back your claims or misinformation is an accurate summation of what you’ve written.
PS: I’m an arborist and if you ask any arborist you will get the same opinion because this is a well established principle in arboriculture at this point, and has been for years. I’m not sure why you’re trying to die on this hill which you evidently don’t have any real knowledge about.
I wouldn’t call that an authoritative source, and its clearly got its own bias. I’m not suggesting all trees are well supported by the skeleton prune, but for things like crape myrtles, and specifically, species that are selected for harsh environments, like where you would plant a crape myrtle, are species that not only can survive or even benefit from a skeleton prune, but that you literally can’t manage a tree into “old age” with out the kind of de-limbing that something like a skeleton prune offers in these specific environments.
Trees didn’t evolve to live in parking lots or tiny strips of soil between a sidewalk and the street. We select for species that can survive these extreme conditions. Those species generally can handle/ or even thrive with a skeleton prune. The case in point is the example this post is about, the crape myrtle.
Another example is citrus trees, especially the more heavily cultivated/ more heavily selected varieties. You quite literally need to skeleton prune these trees, maybe every 5-10 years to keep them productive. This is because we’ve taken them far away from whatever evolutionary trajectory they are on and turned them into basically pets. They don’t self prune or self manage effectively.
I’m not aware of any authority more widely respected on this topic than the International Society of Arboriculture. This is a resource for the general public, so it may look casual but I assure you it is backed by ample research.
But OK, what organization would you suggest?
There are many un-topped crape myrtles in my city and they are invariably far healthier than the topped ones. There’s no truth to the idea that they will explode if not topped.
Again, I’m not advocating for no pruning whatsoever. And there are situations where a pollard or similar heavy pruning might be acceptable, usually to avoid damage to surrounding infrastructure. But this is not done for the tree’s sake, and it is not beneficial or even healthy in the vast majority of cases.
Edit: since you didn’t like my first source for unspecified reasons, here is some published research on the topic, though it does not include crape myrtles in particular.
But I don’t see any reason they would behave differently than other trees, and my own observations match this assumption. They tolerate topping more than other species, just as they tolerate pollution, compacted soil, drought, etc. but to say it’s good for them is just not accurate.
You keep confusing topping with skeleton pruning. At no point have I argued that trees should be topped. I’m making a specific point, about a specific prune (the skeleton prune, which is NOT a topping), about specific types of trees (street trees selected for durability, and often times selectively bred to a point where they don’t self prune effectively), in a specific context (the places we use those kinds of trees, like parking lots and side walks).
Because I too have extensive experience with street trees, street tree management, and also, evaluating the health of trees. And not just one at a time, but hundreds of thousands at a time. I’ve done projects across the US with Davie Tree, and municipalities across looking at street trees, evaluating their health, and yes, also trying to capture some specifics like primary bole and other variables like height from ground to lowest branch. I literally built the tree dataset this study here, is based on. We mapped every tree, primary bole, and lowest branch height, for every street tree in the entirety of Louisville KY.
Pruning is used to reduce the risk of catastrophic branch loss/ removal of hazard branches, and the skeleton prune slows tree growth down to further establish primary boles and reduce the overall risk of branch loss/ hazard limbs. If we don’t prune street trees, they have the strong potential to become hazard vegetation which then requires significantly more extreme management, like whole tree removal.
I’m discussing topping because it’s what’s depicted in the image. I’ve never heard the term skeleton prune before now, so I can only assume this is a regional term. How is it different from topping? A quick google search only returns results related to citrus, which are generally managed with completely different goals from street or ornamental trees. And many of the results were discussing the very negative side-effects of this technique, which appears indistinguishable from topping.
You may have experience but if you were trained incorrectly that doesn’t mean much. Many tree workers rely on conventional wisdom that has been contradicted by modern research, and much harm is done to trees as a result. I’ve asked several times for sources to back up your assertions but you have provided none. All you’ve provided are your opinions which are in contradiction to all of the research, training, and experience I have learned from as an arborist.
And, speaking of conflation, stop falsely representing me as saying trees don’t sometimes need pruning. I agree, they just need pruning that is done in line with arboricultural standards. A well-pruned urban tree would be difficult for an amateur to even identify as pruned. As opposed to this kind of hack job.
Skeleton pruning is a method used on trees to maintain their structure by cutting back all shoots except the main scaffold branches and primary bole, while topping involves cutting off the entire top of a tree. Neither a skeleton prune or topping is going to be appropriate for all trees. It depends on species, context, and management goals. I would describe the prune in the picture as a skeleton prune. And for a Crepe Myrtle, its completely fine. That tree will be fine. They probably won’t have to manage it again for a couple seasons, and when they come back to it in a few years, they can do basically the same prune, and it will probably be just fine.
Its aggressive, and its not pretty for a few months after it happens, but species like Crepe Myrtle, are extremely robust. Its literally why people put them in parking lots. Could you do that do an oak or a redwood? No freaking way. But this isn’t an oak or a redwood. Its a fucking shit big-box store, throw-away, practically plastic Crepe Myrtle. You plant these specifically because you can management his aggressively. I
Your personal experience as an individual arborist doesn’t necessarily map to how people who manage hundreds to thousands of trees need to think about these things. If you are managing a parking lot (or hundreds of parking lots), you need to not drop branches on cars or people. Its a primary consideration of the management goals. Sure they want trees, but if it came down between having trees and getting sued for having even one limb dropping on someones car, they’ll pull the trees in a heartbeat. Extreme pruning, like a skeleton prune, absolutely puts the health of the tree at risk; but that’s sometimes an acceptable risk to take when the alternative is not having trees at all in some environments.
You may have experience but if you were trained incorrectly that doesn’t mean much.
it’s not bad for the tree, necessarily. Most horticultural monstrosities have been selected to basically depend on occasional massive prunings to keep themselves from ripping themselves to shreds over the years.
Even very large species can benefit immensely from an extreme prune, which simulates the kinds of massive catastrophic defoliation evens that happen in nature all the time (fires, hurricanes, tornadoes). It gives the fire branches of the tree more time to and get big with less load to bear.
Sorry this is misinformation. Crape myrtles do tolerate this better than most species but I’ve seen trees killed by this type of “pruning”.
New branches that grow will be poorly attached and become hazards in future years. If the branches are large in diameter or if it’s a species that compartmentalizes decay poorly, then the cut end will rot, often into the main trunk and can cause catastrophic failure in future years. So this is not only ill advised, it’s dangerous to do to a large tree.
Source: https://www.treesaregood.org/Portals/0/TreesAreGood_Why Topping Hurts_0321.pdf
There are some cultivars that grow in odd, unstable forms and can benefit from pruning, but that requires carefully guiding the tree’s growth through selective cuts. Not indiscriminate hacking that only makes the problem worse.
Misinformation? As in… you are/ were putting out misinformation?
Its not misinformation whatsoever to suggest that skeleton pruning is an important practice, and what you are doing is deceptive. Skeleton pruning isn’t just a regular horticultural practice, but quite literally, hundreds and thousands of species simply will tear themselves apart without regular, extreme pruning.
We’re not talking about native plants in some particular ecological context where… well… plants just die some times. And thats fine.
We’re talking about human planted, human managed trees, completely outside of the ecological context they evolved in.
These are parking lot trees. We’re talking about species that are expected to survive in the equivalent of an ecological toilet. And yeah, they’ll destroy themselves without regular management. That’s how plants work.
I already provided a source from the ISA, which is the leading authority on this topic. Please provide a source to back your claims or misinformation is an accurate summation of what you’ve written.
PS: I’m an arborist and if you ask any arborist you will get the same opinion because this is a well established principle in arboriculture at this point, and has been for years. I’m not sure why you’re trying to die on this hill which you evidently don’t have any real knowledge about.
I wouldn’t call that an authoritative source, and its clearly got its own bias. I’m not suggesting all trees are well supported by the skeleton prune, but for things like crape myrtles, and specifically, species that are selected for harsh environments, like where you would plant a crape myrtle, are species that not only can survive or even benefit from a skeleton prune, but that you literally can’t manage a tree into “old age” with out the kind of de-limbing that something like a skeleton prune offers in these specific environments.
Trees didn’t evolve to live in parking lots or tiny strips of soil between a sidewalk and the street. We select for species that can survive these extreme conditions. Those species generally can handle/ or even thrive with a skeleton prune. The case in point is the example this post is about, the crape myrtle.
Another example is citrus trees, especially the more heavily cultivated/ more heavily selected varieties. You quite literally need to skeleton prune these trees, maybe every 5-10 years to keep them productive. This is because we’ve taken them far away from whatever evolutionary trajectory they are on and turned them into basically pets. They don’t self prune or self manage effectively.
I’m not aware of any authority more widely respected on this topic than the International Society of Arboriculture. This is a resource for the general public, so it may look casual but I assure you it is backed by ample research.
But OK, what organization would you suggest?
There are many un-topped crape myrtles in my city and they are invariably far healthier than the topped ones. There’s no truth to the idea that they will explode if not topped.
Again, I’m not advocating for no pruning whatsoever. And there are situations where a pollard or similar heavy pruning might be acceptable, usually to avoid damage to surrounding infrastructure. But this is not done for the tree’s sake, and it is not beneficial or even healthy in the vast majority of cases.
Edit: since you didn’t like my first source for unspecified reasons, here is some published research on the topic, though it does not include crape myrtles in particular.
But I don’t see any reason they would behave differently than other trees, and my own observations match this assumption. They tolerate topping more than other species, just as they tolerate pollution, compacted soil, drought, etc. but to say it’s good for them is just not accurate.
You keep confusing topping with skeleton pruning. At no point have I argued that trees should be topped. I’m making a specific point, about a specific prune (the skeleton prune, which is NOT a topping), about specific types of trees (street trees selected for durability, and often times selectively bred to a point where they don’t self prune effectively), in a specific context (the places we use those kinds of trees, like parking lots and side walks).
Because I too have extensive experience with street trees, street tree management, and also, evaluating the health of trees. And not just one at a time, but hundreds of thousands at a time. I’ve done projects across the US with Davie Tree, and municipalities across looking at street trees, evaluating their health, and yes, also trying to capture some specifics like primary bole and other variables like height from ground to lowest branch. I literally built the tree dataset this study here, is based on. We mapped every tree, primary bole, and lowest branch height, for every street tree in the entirety of Louisville KY.
Pruning is used to reduce the risk of catastrophic branch loss/ removal of hazard branches, and the skeleton prune slows tree growth down to further establish primary boles and reduce the overall risk of branch loss/ hazard limbs. If we don’t prune street trees, they have the strong potential to become hazard vegetation which then requires significantly more extreme management, like whole tree removal.
I’m discussing topping because it’s what’s depicted in the image. I’ve never heard the term skeleton prune before now, so I can only assume this is a regional term. How is it different from topping? A quick google search only returns results related to citrus, which are generally managed with completely different goals from street or ornamental trees. And many of the results were discussing the very negative side-effects of this technique, which appears indistinguishable from topping.
You may have experience but if you were trained incorrectly that doesn’t mean much. Many tree workers rely on conventional wisdom that has been contradicted by modern research, and much harm is done to trees as a result. I’ve asked several times for sources to back up your assertions but you have provided none. All you’ve provided are your opinions which are in contradiction to all of the research, training, and experience I have learned from as an arborist.
And, speaking of conflation, stop falsely representing me as saying trees don’t sometimes need pruning. I agree, they just need pruning that is done in line with arboricultural standards. A well-pruned urban tree would be difficult for an amateur to even identify as pruned. As opposed to this kind of hack job.
Skeleton pruning is a method used on trees to maintain their structure by cutting back all shoots except the main scaffold branches and primary bole, while topping involves cutting off the entire top of a tree. Neither a skeleton prune or topping is going to be appropriate for all trees. It depends on species, context, and management goals. I would describe the prune in the picture as a skeleton prune. And for a Crepe Myrtle, its completely fine. That tree will be fine. They probably won’t have to manage it again for a couple seasons, and when they come back to it in a few years, they can do basically the same prune, and it will probably be just fine.
Its aggressive, and its not pretty for a few months after it happens, but species like Crepe Myrtle, are extremely robust. Its literally why people put them in parking lots. Could you do that do an oak or a redwood? No freaking way. But this isn’t an oak or a redwood. Its a fucking shit big-box store, throw-away, practically plastic Crepe Myrtle. You plant these specifically because you can management his aggressively. I
Your personal experience as an individual arborist doesn’t necessarily map to how people who manage hundreds to thousands of trees need to think about these things. If you are managing a parking lot (or hundreds of parking lots), you need to not drop branches on cars or people. Its a primary consideration of the management goals. Sure they want trees, but if it came down between having trees and getting sued for having even one limb dropping on someones car, they’ll pull the trees in a heartbeat. Extreme pruning, like a skeleton prune, absolutely puts the health of the tree at risk; but that’s sometimes an acceptable risk to take when the alternative is not having trees at all in some environments.
Man you are insufferable.