branch collar

[murphy4trees]

OK,
I have a pruning practice not to cut into any live tissue growing around a dry limb or stub...

Here are a few pics which I have resized very small by request of a dial up arborist... Let me know if you like the new sizes as I'll keep all the resizes small if that works...

This first pic is of a cherry limb that was removed by another climber... He cut off the live tissue as seen here.. I don't like that...

This is one area where Big Jon and I disagree... Though he didn't cut this one, hecuts them like this

 

[murphy4trees]

Here's the pic

 

[murphy4trees]

and the reverse of the same cut

 

[murphy4trees]

Here are a couple of cuts I made on a large pin oak yesterday..

First the stub before, pretty obviously left by a do it yourselfer..

 

[murphy4trees]

And my cut

 

[murphy4trees]

another smaller stub

 

[murphy4trees]

And a cut of a dying branch.. had some green on it, but it was on its way out... This is a diffucult limb to target so I cut it long, erring on the side of leaving a stub, rather than cutting the trunk..

IS the science on this definitive???

Thanks,

 

[ROLLACOSTA]

personaly i think you may have cut back a little bit to far ..but yes thats the way i would have pruned the oak stub..i find oaks often show the arborist where to cut

 

[Guy Meilleur]

Originally posted by murphy4trees
IS the science on this definitive???

Fairly. From Gilman's Pruning book p. 61-2:
"Final cuts..must be made just outside the swollen collar...The swollen collar left on the trunk after a proper pruning cut is not a stub."
The key word here is "swollen". If some wrinkled tissue goes out on a rotten stub, not all of it needs to be saved, even tho it may be considered stem tissue. When faced with a series of "collars" at the base of a branch, I pick a vigorous-looking, swollen one as a target, where there's more woundwood than rot in the cross-section.

"i find oaks often show the arborist where to cut", like rc said.

nice pics and good cutting. If a client or someone says you're leaving stubs, point to the wrinkles, which are stem tissue, and tell them they're burls-in-the-making.

 

[Guy Meilleur]

o and ps--if BigJon is cutting off that callus tissue like in your 2nd example that the tree worked so hard to make, that's a big no-no. Another reason to prune w handsaw instead of chainsaw--less good (stem) tissue removed

 

[jkrueger]

Originally posted by murphy4trees
And a cut of a dying branch.. had some green on it, but it was on its way out... This is a diffucult limb to target so I cut it long, erring on the side of leaving a stub, rather than cutting the trunk..

IS the science on this definitive???

Thanks,

First; think the pics could be a little bigger.

Second; this last cut is OK, and the others are a little out side of what they should be, to prevent rot and eventualy move inside of closure.

I'm prbably some where between your cuts and John's. His seem a little to much and yours close and not all for me. I will sometimes graze the existing closure and not not realy cut into it.

Jack

 

[glens]

Thanks for the effort on the images; for a few moments there I almost felt like I was on broadband!&nbsp; You <i>could</i> leave them a bit larger (even double the current byte-size) for a little better balance between ease of seeing and ease of fetching.&nbsp; There were certainly adequate (if barely) in size for my 17" 1152&times;864 monitor, though.

Oh, technically, I'm not an arborist, but thanks for the compliment!

With that caveat, I can safely say that I would rather take just a smidgen of the outer collar radius than leave dead wood around which the collar will still need to extend to capture.&nbsp; It would really be trick to be able to remove dead wood to a position recessed to the very inner edge of the collar, but that would require a router, I'd think.

Glen

 

[Tom Dunlap]

Cutting into any live tissue will cause another wound. The tree is better off with a smidgeon of stub rather than a smidgeon of live wood cut off. Shigo and Gilman both speak along this line.

Breaking new CODIT barriers is not good. If the limb is declining, look for the collar or leave it long and come back another time to cut to the collar.

Tom

 

[jkrueger]

Originally posted by Tom Dunlap
Cutting into any live tissue will cause another wound. The tree is better off with a smidgeon of stub rather than a smidgeon of live wood cut off. Shigo and Gilman both speak along this line.

Breaking new CODIT barriers is not good. If the limb is declining, look for the collar or leave it long and come back another time to cut to the collar.

Tom

Tom,

It is almost impossible to go against your references to the cut. And grazing the collar I've found possibly even excites an effort to continue the seal.

Having encountered many short stubs with the tees attempt to seal itself and have the rot from the stub extending damage to the branch or leader it is connected to is what is my obsevatiuon. Anyone else see what I'm refering to?

Jack

 

[Nickrosis]

Originally posted by jkrueger
It is almost impossible to go against your references to the cut. And grazing the collar I've found possibly even excites an effort to continue the seal.

I couldn't disagree with you more on this point. There is no reason to excite a tree. The Lord of the Rings is not a good principle in riling up trees to action. Trees are best left with the smallest wound possible - a flush cut, even to the smallest degree, will enlarge the wound.

Rapid closure has been researched and found to be a lesser factor in decay prevention in trees. Trees that were intentionally flush cut to speed wound closure ended up with more discolored/decayed wood than trees that were target pruned.

Originally posted by Tom Dunlap
The tree is better off with a smidgeon of stub rather than a smidgeon of live wood cut off. Shigo and Gilman both speak along this line.

Ach, you won't get Shigo to say that! I've seen him asked that specific question a couple of times, and he responds everytime saying that you should cut at the collar, no closer, no further. It's an ideal that is a micron in width, but it is our target!

I've left stubs and flush cut many, many times, but I had the best intentions. Sometimes it isn't until afterwards where you get on the other side and realized you took too much/little.

It's not quite like a barber where they always say too long is better than too short because you can't put hair back on. But in trees, too long is still too long. Idealistic, I know, but it's a goal.

 

[dbeck]

hey nickrosis,

TD was talking about the original topic of a dead limb and not cutting into the callous tissue growing around it. In which case he is right. Do not get so close that you hit that tissue. barriers upon barriers are created(does that make sense?). If you leave under an eigth of an inch of a stub - I would call that good. IMO!

As far as your other comments, I agree. Do not prune w/ an agenda to create rapid callous growth...that's silly. Pick a modern arboriculture book and read it.(from a reputable author). you couldn't have put better emphasis on target pruning. Strive for that target, but do not go past it. To do so introduces decay in the trunk tissues, not just the branch tissues. At least that is the jist of what I gathered from 5 yrs w/ Doc. Miller.

 

[Gord]

I think a bit of discretion is advised when callus growth is creeping out along a stub. Some species' deadwood will hang on an awfully long time, long enough for a lengthy callus-stub to form. when i'm confronted with this i make the cut to my best estimation of the old collar. sometimes a well placed boot makes the best cut, inside the callus. if the callus extends just an inch or two out i'll leave it. it also depends on the size of limb the callus is on of course.

and nick, did you really hear shigo say that?!! with your own ears?

 

[BigJohn]

When making a flush cut on a dead stub I treat it or look at as if the whole branch was there and prune it back to the "collar" just as you should. I like to get rid of all the rotting wood. I can't see leaving rotting or diseased wood still in a tree. I treat it like cancer. I get rid of all the cancer and don't like to leave any behind to infect the tree. If it looks like a healthy calus roll then I don't see a need to cut it off though.

 

[Tom Dunlap]

quote:Originally posted by Tom Dunlap
The tree is better off with a smidgeon of stub rather than a smidgeon of live wood cut off. Shigo and Gilman both speak along this line.


Ach, you won't get Shigo to say that! I've seen him asked that specific question a couple of times, and he responds everytime saying that you should cut at the collar, no closer, no further. It's an ideal that is a micron in width, but it is our target!

Nick,

I didn't quote, I said, "along this line"

But...you are right! I have heard Alex, with my own ears, many times say that the collar is the place to cut, no where else. He doesn't leave us any wiggle room either. When I took his four-day class back in about '85 a number of people tried to point out included branches or other hard to cut collars and asked where to cut. He ALWAYS said at the collar. No discussion.

Now, faced with the decision to make a cut at the collar that would make another wound or leave a stub and eliminate the extra wound, I leave a stub. Think of how many of the linden cultivars grow. EVERY limb is included to an extent. In order to cut at the collar it would require the use of a cut-off wheel mounted on an angle grinder. That's possible but not practical. I don't think I'm a good enough salesman to talk anyone into paying the kind of money it would take to make "proper" cuts in this situation. Instead, I look at it like darts. Aim for the triple twenty and hope not to have the dart bounce off the board. Shigo also says that any time we can "Grab 80%, plus of minus ten" we should, "Grab it and run!" When I have to make these stub/wound decisions, I look at it like an 80% chance. Let the tree sort out the details.

No matter how good anyone feels about cutting off callous growth, if it is live tissue, its WRONG to cut it off.

Time for a biology/botany class, Big Jon Trees don't get cancer. They wall-off decay. Study CODIT.

Not good to mix plant and animal physiology.

Heal/seal
Bleed/sap run

When a tree grows callous over a stub it is not good to make another wound. Unless you want to encourge rot and make hollow spots for raccoons.

Gord, I know what you mean about boot-cuts! Especially on old oak stubs.
Tom

 

[Guy Meilleur]

Originally posted by Gord
a lengthy callus-stub to form. when i'm confronted with this i make the cut to my best estimation of the old collar.

I see no sense in this. If the stem tissue is growing ove the branch, that is the collar. Why look for the original collar location? that became irrelevant long before,

"many short stubs with the tees attempt to seal itself and have the rot from the stub extending damage to the branch or leader it is connected to"

yet I hear what jk is talking about here. If there's active decay (and sometimes ya gotta wiggle a finger in there to see) and weak collar growth, it gets cut back to a bulging wrinkle in the bark, which is the sign of a natural target collar.
"I pick a vigorous-looking, swollen one as a target, where there's more woundwood than rot in the cross-section." what he said.