Betula Utilis Jaquamanii

[Terry Deans]

A customer of mine wants me to prune back some birches which are in their carpark. I have read up on this in my RHS book and it says late winter/early spring, with some able to be done in late summer to early autumn referrring to the sap bleeding that may take place if relevant to the particular group.

By the looks of things they want fairly severe pruning as the trees are 'obstructing the views from the lower floor'!! I think they are completely mad as this will result in lovely 16-18 ft trees being reduced by around 6-8ft, but I may be wrong!

Could someone please throw some more light on this regarding both the pruning time and severity and what result this will have on the health of the trees and their size and quality following this action. Any assistance and time afforded to this is very much appreciated as I would be very keen on not causing long term damage to such wonderful young trees. Thank you. Terry Deans

[brooklyn1]

Where do you live? In most US municipalities if they're your trees on your land and not hanging over the property line then the best thing to do is to ignore the mutants or everytime you see them toss them the bird.... me, just for fun I'd plant a dense row of tall evergreens just so the creeps can't have a view all year. Birch do not respond well to pruning... leave them be.... birch are actually self pruning, any dead wood will drop to the ground.