# Rubbing or crossing branches?



## beastmaster (Nov 25, 2012)

Yesterday I worked on an Oak that had two huge crossing branches. Where they crossed was full of decay from years and years of rubbing together. In the past I have put a piece of wood between rubbing branches then run a rod through both branches and the block of wood and bolt them up tight. But this was on a few small ornamental trees. I chose to just leave it be on the Oak, and hopefully it shouldn't be a problem in my life time. 
What is the right course of action on a big mature tree with large crossing branches where damage is being caused by constant rubbing? It not like one of the branches can be removed at that point. I'v seen a lot of trees graft them selfs in that situation, but others suffer damage. Don't think Iv seen one fail because of that though.


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## imagineero (Nov 25, 2012)

Remove one or both of the branches. 

You guys stateside seem to be a lot gamer with stuff like bolting, cabling and bracing than we are here in aus. Its too much of a liability for us. I tend to err on the side of caution both in terms of assessing trees and in doing work on them, but then pretty much all of my work is tight quarters residential where the targets are people or houses. There isn't room to be generous, and the trees I work on generally don't have heritage/high dollar values. If you're talking about heritage trees worth hundreds of thousands of $$$ then things are different.

Pruning/maintenance work for the type of trees I work on is pretty basic. It's often a little bit of property clearance, and occasionally a crown lift. We're limited to 10% of canopy reduction per 12 month period and generally take a little less than that. My priorities depend on the species, but once the property clearance and deadwooding is taken care of I go for crossing limbs as a priority, and any limbs that are showing signs of cracking/rot etc. On some species that tend towards spreading heavy limbs I do weight reduction. 

Thinking in tree time, you can get quite a bit of extended life out of an unnatural residential tree by early shaping and weight reduction on limbs. For overmature trees all you're really doing is hazard reduction, the tree is in decline already. Removing a large crossed over limb from an overmature tree accelerates the decline a little, but it reduces the risk a little too. You're heading towards eventual removal anyhow. I would leave them alone before bolting, because it exposes me to liability.

It's so case by case really.

Shaun


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## Bermie (Nov 25, 2012)

Assess what the implications are for each branch should you remove one of them, and for the tree overall if you remove both.
Is one helping support the other?
Can you achieve separation by reducing end weight on one?

In some bigger trees, or where the crossing branches are well established I have left them alone, sometimes the tree is already dealing with the decay satisfactorily.

I can't help but think bolting them together wouldn't help...if they have been rubbing, surely that means there is movement in the area...bolting would change the dynamics?


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## arborjockey (Dec 11, 2012)

Would removing them make a big hole? Can you lighten them to stop so much movement? Can you cablle it if its that much of a problem? If their somewhat similar one directly above the other I always leave the lower take out the top for sap flow puposes. Why are you so scared to cut one out? how big are they?

And here's a rant to boot,

For Suan.
I think its criminal to tell an arborist he can only take 10% or 20 or 30. This choice can't be made by a government official. Trees kill people, trees destroy homes, they blow over, they blow in half, for someone to say you can only take so much is ridicules. Every 15 - 30 we get horrendous winds and many urban trees are wrecked. Oh don't tip prune, that fir, don't reduce the canapy of that oak. Then boom the whole trees gone. This is the case with the I.S.A. what they don't have a memeory of these storms? My boss in oregon rarely gets call for storm damage in his trees where other company's have been light pruning and the canapys are full of broken branches. Trees in an urban environment have to be hard pruned at times. A massive storm blew through here in Indiana. My buddy has 2 big silver Maples. They're the biggest by far in the neighbor hood. Well guess which trees had zero large limbs break out. Yeah while all the trees that were lightly pruned blew over or had large spars tear out. Ultimately ruining the entire tree. Every trees different but when your the biggest tree around you get the extent of the wind. Topping, heading back, canopy reduction, removing the sail, heavy tip pruning, in rare cases is a must.


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## beastmaster (Dec 11, 2012)

The tree in question and the situation in general are big mature limbs that at this point would be detrimental to the trees health or leave a large hole if removed.
I think sometimes it's harder to remove 15% or 20% from a tree and make it look nice than taking out more. I am from the school of thought, less is more on trimming, but it's impossible to generalize a certain %. Trees that have never been trimmed or have been maintained like that, you can get a way removing a small percentage. Some trees, especially those that have been hammered in the past and have grown back full of suckers with bushy thick ends and crowns have to have more taking out of them. Here in So. Ca. at lest lots of home owners want their ornamental trees shaped and laced and taking thinner then,''the book,'' says. Their trees will have to be trimmed every year like that, but some people accept that. Commeral trees are almost always taking 50% unless your working for a really progressive management company. Again, the trees will replace what you cut out by next summer.
Here in So. Calif. the live oak is king, their protected by state law and many city's have local ordinances limiting how big a branch you can cut(3 in. a lot of citys) and the max percentage that can be removed.
It very easy to over trim a tree, and quick regrowth, sun burn, suckers and a host of other problems can result, but a lot depends on the speices and use and size of the tree. In a perfect world 15 % would be all most trees needed every few years, but the world is far from perfect.


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## Nailsbeats (Dec 11, 2012)

arborjockey said:


> Would removing them make a big hole? Can you lighten them to stop so much movement? Can you cablle it if its that much of a problem? If their somewhat similar one directly above the other I always leave the lower take out the top for sap flow puposes. Why are you so scared to cut one out? how big are they?
> 
> And here's a rant to boot,
> 
> ...



I'll second that Silver Maple topping bonanza, there's just no substitute for it at times.


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## ATH (Dec 11, 2012)

beastmaster said:


> ...In the past I have put a piece of wood between rubbing branches then run a rod through both branches and the block of wood and bolt them up tight. But this was on a few small ornamental trees. I chose to just leave it be on the Oak...
> .



Why leave them and go through the trouble of bracing _on the smaller trees_ instead of just removing one of them?

I understand why you are leaving the oak. As others have suggested, I'd see if you can take some weight off of the top one and leave the bottom one alone. They may still rub, but should be less significant.


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## beastmaster (Dec 12, 2012)

ATH said:


> Why leave them and go through the trouble of bracing _on the smaller trees_ instead of just removing one of them?
> 
> I understand why you are leaving the oak. As others have suggested, I'd see if you can take some weight off of the top one and leave the bottom one alone. They may still rub, but should be less significant.



The smaller trees I braced were multi leader ornamental trees, I think one was a small olive and a Peruvian pepper. Even being smaller trees the rubbing/crossing branches would of removed a 1/3 of the tree. It was a long time ago, maybe they didn't need it. I went on a cabling/bracing rampage about 20 years ago. We grow, we learn, we learn the real truth with time. Oh God protect me from the sins of my youth.


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## imagineero (Dec 12, 2012)

arborjockey said:


> For Suan.
> I think its criminal to tell an arborist he can only take 10% or 20 or 30. This choice can't be made by a government official......This is the case with the I.S.A. what they don't have a memeory of these storms?Topping, heading back, canopy reduction, removing the sail, heavy tip pruning, in rare cases is a must.....



I think it's criminal you can't spell my name right ;-)

It's a shame that things are the way they are, but I think it's necesary. The industry in aus (and probably in the states too) is that the industry has failed to self regulate. It's not hard to get your basic arb ticket in aus, it only takes a year. They've put the requirement up now, so you need to be a level 3 which takes a second year. Guys should have done the right thing, but they abused it and topped and hacked trees. It's mostly driven by uninformed customers, but the flipside of the coin is uneducated tree workers who are hungry for a dollar and readily agree to push the limit way too far.

I've found most councils are very reasonable, when legitimate work is done. The 10% is really a soft limit, it's just there to give them grounds for prosecution of obvious hacks. You can easily apply for and receive a permit for more than that amount, so long as you're doing legitimate tree work. If you were in the position of being a tree officer and had to name some kind of base percentage for all trees to prevent destruction of trees, would you have put the number at 50%? Higher? Unlimited for anyone qualified? For what it's worth, the council tree officers are almost all ex tree workers put out to pasture, most have 20+ years industry experience and a minimum of a diploma in horticulture. I think it's a sensible base. If you want to start saying that ISA is all wrong then I haven't got much to say to you ;-)

I'd rather remove a tree and replant something more appropriate than top it. If you're happy selling continuous topping of trees then maybe you ought to be in powerline clearance work ;-) For myself, I'm trying to sell quality tree work.
Shaun


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## arborjockey (Dec 12, 2012)

Sorry sean
I'll put this again. KEEP THE GOVERNMENT OUT OF ALL BUSINESS. Everyone they have ever tried to help they have crushed with ignorance. Now keep in mind I've gotten the boot from 2 websites down under because of politics. You have no freedom of speech down under and that's a crime. We left the queen because of taxation without representation and that's what government leads to. We have that now in our country and I don't want it getting worse. Your council members have 20 years in the business. If their so good how come EKKA cant get on board My consulting arborist is 87. He understands the Japanese have been pruning this way for thousands of years and it works. They're in the same climate as the N.W and parts of Hawaii. Some of these VISTA prunes are done on trees that are older then Gods grandpa. Year after year. Now you come along and say remove and replant. 

Other trees we do crown reductions on are 80 to 100 years old and they sit on multi million dollar hotels. You tell the heads groundman during a recession that you want to remove and replant. In Oregon when they put in new subdivisions they just build around the giant fir trees that the contractor felt like leaving. Now you have a 160' tree with no supporting forest around it. The tree becomes a giant sail with no root system. It has to be tip pruned until deemed safe. The ol boy answered my question "How much do I take" saying. "cut it back tell right before you kill it" 

Every tree needs to be taken different. I was a big pretty prune guy for many years tell I broadened my view to major storms. When some really big ones blew through the trees I said would be damaged were. The ones that were managed properly didn't. I don't top trees and most guys will look at my work and say I don't. But their is a place for saving a tree that's going to cripple itself. Trees fallow sunlight and through that isotropism they over extend themselves to a point of no return. I just help correct it.


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## Sunrise Guy (Dec 13, 2012)

In an Oak Wilt area, like Austin, TX., it is not a good idea to let branches remain in a position where they are rubbing on each other. The constant wounding/healing cycle opens the tree up to invasion by nitidulid beetles that are the vector species for Oak Wilt. In cases where branches are rubbing, in an oak, the removal of one of the branches is strongly recommended if you cannot stop the rubbing by weight reduction pruning of the uppermost branch. As many opportunistic pathogens will take advantage of bark reduction/removal in those branches that constantly rub on each other, in many different tree species, I never let any branches continue to stay in close proximity to each other, where rubbing may occur.


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## Pelorus (Dec 13, 2012)

I read an interesting (kinda weird) thread on the buzz about Jomoco hanging flower pots from limbs to produce reaction wood.
You might want to consider the Jomoco Protocol and suspend an anvil or something from the lower limb to provide some clearance.


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