Reasonable pruning, a more than positive alternative to severe and radical pruning!
The severe sizes, generally practiced:
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Without knowledge of the subject
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To limit the height of the tree and / or its leaf surface
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To bring brightness in the gardens, or on the houses
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Limiting the development of leaf mass
These sizes can in no case meet all these expectations and will only lead in the long term to mechanical and biological deficiencies. Trees are living things, and like all they react very badly to the slightest external attack that may be inflicted on them.
Undertake a radical pruning (topping, reduction ...) on your tree (fig. 1) will necessarily lead to the formation of suckers the following spring. The latter will quickly grow in size and height in the years to come.
If you thought you could get the light by removing the leaf mass, well it is missed!
A large part of people think that these rejections are a sign of the tree's proper functioning, but this is completely FALSE!
fig. 1: topping of a hundred-year-old linden tree ravaged by Ganoderma (lignivorous mushrooms)
Indeed, by carrying out this type of drastic pruning, all or almost all of the leaf mass, essential for the proper biological functioning of the tree allowing it to carry out photosynthesis, is eliminated.
To compensate for this sudden loss, and thus survive, the plant will compensate as quickly as possible by the formation of suckers from latent buds.
We therefore end up with almost the same leaf volume in just two years.
With regard to the tree, too large and large wounds are likely in a majority of cases not to heal completely and therefore to let the trunk deteriorate very quickly or even widen (fig. 2 and 3) .
They could subsequently entail risks of degeneration, the implantation of bacteria, diseases, lignivorous fungi or even wood-eating insects, (fig. 4 and 5) having very significant negative impacts on the biological and mechanical future. of the tree.
All this will make it dangerous and subject to numerous tree breaks, or even the whole tree in some cases.
fig. 2 and 3: incomplete scarring following poor cutting and decay of an entire trunk following topping.
Diagram of the evolution of the tree after a severe topping or pruning ( fig. 6) :
fig.6
fig. 4 and 5: Great Capricorn of the Oak and Ganoderma (parasite of the root system) on the headless lime tree in fig. 1
Attached in PDF, a detailed explanatory diagram of the differences between severe size and reasoned size.
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