Proper Pruning & Trimming Tips & Tricks

Landscaping comes with a variety of tasks that don’t just include your grass or flowerbeds. Yes, keeping these areas properly mowed and weed-free is essential. However, have you taken a look at your trees and bushes lately? At this point, you might be ashamed to admit that you haven’t given your foliage the attention it deserves, but it’s okay! The Grounds Guys of Gettysburg is here to help with some proper pruning techniques and some important pruning and trimming tips to keep in mind.

Let’s get started!

Why You Need to Prune & Trim Your Trees

Before we dive in, let’s discuss why it’s important to prune and trim your trees and bushes. Like anything, your greenspace needs routine maintenance to remain healthy. Neglect will always be detrimental to your landscaping; we certainly don’t want that.

Some benefits of pruning and trimming include:

• Eliminating dead or dying parts
• Allowing new growth to flourish
• Protecting currently healthy areas
• Safeguarding your property from damage
• Keeping yourself and others from injury
• Deterring a pest infestation

Whether you’re implementing pruning and trimming techniques as a preventative action or a tree-saving measure, you can fortify your trees and bushes long term.

Types of Pruning & Trimming Techniques

When it comes to pruning, there’s a right and wrong way. Sure, it’s mostly about removing damaged or dying tree limbs, but you can’t just cut indiscriminately. There has to be a method to the madness, as they say. So, let’s talk about proper pruning and trimming techniques.

Dead Branch Removal

Removing dead branches from trees is extremely important to avoid issues with the rest of the tree. Still, you shouldn’t just lop off an entire branch. Making a series of cuts will help you avoid removing healthy parts and keep the bark from splitting. You should start cutting at the bottom of the dead branch and cut off small notches at least 2 feet away from the trunk.

Reduction Trimming

When you want to decrease the length of healthy tree limbs, reduction trimming is your best bet. However, you need to understand the type of tree genus you’re dealing with to avoid pruning too much and causing irreparable damage to your tree.

Heading/Thinning Cuts

Thinning cuts protect your tree from internal decay by removing a side branch back to the trunk. You can improve curb appeal by thinning trees and reducing foliage density, encouraging interior branch growth.

Keep in Mind the 3 Ds When Pruning & Trimming

Pruning and trimming trees and bushes is a pretty straightforward fall and spring clean-up task. But you must keep the 3 Ds in mind so that you don’t unintentionally cause issues for your greenery. In landscaping speak, the 3 Ds involve removing dead, diseased, and dying trees.

Remove Dead Trees

As much as you might want to bring dead trees back to life, your efforts will likely prove fruitless. We know. It may be sad to let a tree go, but you could be doing more harm than good by leaving it as is. Give your healthy trees a leg up by removing the unsalvageable ones.

Your tree may be dead if you notice the following signs:

• Fungus or mushrooms growing on the tree’s base
• Peeling bark
• Cracked or split bark
• No leaves on the tree

Remove Diseased Trees

A dead tree is almost impossible to revive, but a diseased tree may still have some life left in it. Unfortunately, revitalizing a diseased tree takes a lot of time and energy. So, the best option may be to remove it and prevent it from infecting other plant life and their root systems.

Signs you have a diseased tree include:

• Bark abnormalities
• A tree that’s leaning
• Leaf discoloration
• A pest infestation
• Excessive fungus or mold growth

Our Gettysburg landscaping professionals would love to help you evaluate a diseased tree to try treatments to get it healthy again or remove it completely—whatever works best for you.

Remove Dying Trees

Depending on the extent of the damage, we recommend removing a dying tree. In many cases, a tree that isn’t entirely dead is too far gone to bring back to life. That being said, our Gettysburg team can perform a diagnosis and provide a detailed report of our findings.   

Your tree could be dying if you notice:

• Bark decay
• Lack of foliage
• Dead branches
• Fungus or mold on the bark

An effective fungicide can help eliminate the specific disease plaguing your trees and bushes. Remember, diseases don’t just affect the tree trunk itself; they can also impact the branches and soil.

Professional Pruning & Trimming Can Make Your Landscape Thrive

Pruning and trimming trees doesn’t have to be an undertaking when you have professionals on your side. Grounds Guys of Gettysburg makes the process convenient and easy, and all you have to do is sit back and watch us work magic on your yard. You can schedule periodic tree and bush pruning or request spring or fall clean-up services to give your landscape the curb appeal it deserves.

Call for more information or request a free trimming and pruning estimate today.