Here is an article I wrote and published locally here a couple of years ago.
“TOPPING”, OR THE PRACTICE OF TREE MUTILATION
The definition of the word “mutilate” is, 1. to cut off or damage a limb or other important part of a person or animal (in this case, trees); 2. To damage, injure, or otherwise make imperfect, especially by removing an essential part or parts. There we have it! Tree topping summed up in one word, MUTILATION!! It is a crying shame that various forms of “topping” is still being performed by some as a valid form of tree care. The tree care industry has established tree pruning standards that govern the proper pruning of trees. Information is available through the International Society of Arboriculture, National Arborist Association, various Universities, and professional Arborists. Fortunately there are many good Arborists in our area that can instruct you on proper tree care.
The tree care practices in the Silver Valley are especially apparent that more education is needed to teach people about proper tree care. Every where you look you see trees that have been butchered and are full of heart rot, excessive water sprouts, weakly attached limbs, and hazards to the nearby residence. These trees should be beautiful, graceful, and majestic, with strong scaffold branching supporting a rich green leafy crown, but instead look like they have experienced a nuclear blast or the Mt. Saint Helen’s eruption. It seems like when I am in the Silver Valley I spent most of my time explaining to people why I won’t top their tree. I often hear the concern, “I feel that my tree is to tall”. Believe it or not, many trees are supposed to be tall. Trees are highly engineered and designed woody plants that have specific growth characteristics unique to each species. It is quite apparent that some trees like to grow one hundred feet tall or more, and some trees grow less then fifteen feet tall. When you take a tree that is presently fifty feet tall or taller and reduce its height to lets say, twenty five feet, this tree is going to respond by putting out an excessive amount of water sprouts (suckers) throughout the remaining crown. Water sprouts that form on the main scaffold branches or the trunk of the tree many times are a sign that the tree is in decline or has been severely damaged. These water sprouts that form the new crown will have an accelerated growth rate of four to five feet a year or possible more when the average growth rate should be about ten to twelve inches a year. Within a few years the tree is at the same height that it was before the tree has it’s crown amputated, except now its full of rot, birds, hazards, disease, insects not to mention it’s ugliness during the winter time. If you think your tree is dangerous, it should be inspected by a qualified Arborist.
There are other fancy terms that are used to promote this type of tree destruction such as height reduction, crown reduction, pollarding, and drop crotch pruning. Although there are instances where these types of pruning are preferred or necessary, many times it is done wrong and falls under the category of topping. Lets take for instance “drop crotch pruning”. When this is done correctly the terminal branch is removed back to a lateral branch that is at least one-third the size of the parent branch. The lateral branch should have somewhat of an upward sweep to maintain the apical dominance of the stem. Cutting a four inch branch back to a one-half inch lateral that has no upward growth is not drop crotch pruning. It is of my opinion that any pruning on large deciduous trees that produces excessive suckering and heart rot is improper pruning.
There are other situations where someone might want to control the height on a smaller ornamental tree by making heading cuts year after year. This is fine as long as they realize that they will never have a natural looking tree. I know some that shear their hawthorn tree into a lolly-pop every year, or shear their blue spruce into a fine textured formal Christmas tree. There is nothing wrong with this if this is your desired effect.
There are many issues and circumstances that have not been addressed such as hazardous tree assessment, cabling and bracing, crown thinning to reduce wind sail, tree structure formation, ornamental pruning, shearing of deciduous and evergreen shrubs, root systems, and soils that all play a part of proper tree care. If there is one practice that I would like to see stopped, it is the topping of mature trees. It’s sad to see well meaning people pay good money only to have their trees mutilated.
Look what you made me do.
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