Somebody thinks this is attractive

Interesting-

This one is choice-

This family "accessorized" their yard art-

My mother prunes everything like that. She's proud of her massacre. These trees remind me of Bart Simpson.

Guess hole-nesting birds like them!

Resin

Oh, how super SAD!!!!!!!

This "pruning" is very common in the some sections of the upper south. I've seen it in TN, WV, VA and NC. In addition I've seen it used on college campuses and other public grounds. The public grounds are not nearly as severe but they still give you a jolt when you see them. Has anyone noticed the huge numbers Pyrus calleryana planted throughout the same region? They are literally everywhere.

Since hurricane Ivan there are trees like those on every street here. I don't know why they don't just cut them down all together if they're so afraid of them. Many of them ended up dying anyways.

they do that here in San Antonio all the time... it is so gross.

WHY doesn't the word get out to prune NO MORE than 1/3 of the tree???

So sad.

Meet my mother - she'll cut you down to size by 2 thirds in no time.

To quote a fellow Alabamian:

Peony01
Prattville, AL
(Zone 8a)

Mar 19, 2006
2:09 PM

Post #2123388

Please prune your crapemyltle to see through it, not over it. Prune up, not down. "Crape murder" is the phrase we use. Commercial landscapers in our area are the ones who taught residential gardeners this practice. But, it is your plant. Pruning the topside will only produce spindly stems/branches. It will look arthritic.

I guess "crape murder" has caught on.

I will admit that I had this happen to one of my trees. I had a pecan tree in my front yard that had some broken branches in the upper part of the crown. At the time finding a tree trimmer was difficult because of the hurricane, but I ended up hiring a guy who had done some work for me before. I told him to prune the top 1/4 of the tree, those would have been smaller sized branches. I left to go run some errands and when I got back home my pecan tree looked like the trees in those photos. Talk about angry! It took everything I could do to control my temper. In the end we agreed that he would cut the whole tree down and I wouldn't pay him a dime.

Always stand there and supervise your tree trimmers.

I live in a part of NC where this kind of "topping" is common. Of course what happens is that the tree dies. Every year the Cooperative extension publishes an article in the local paper explaining why this is a bad idea, but still, it happens every year.

woodspirit1 I've seen it there too. What amazed me was the amount done on university campuses. Surely someone there would understand that this is detrimental. We saw fresh work done last spring. Oh well, here we have people planting Euonymus alatus by the boat load. And I saw my neighbor completely re-landscape a double lot. His shade trees of choice were all Acer saccharinum. He had room for three very large trees and that was his only choice! He will fill up all the neighbor's evetroughs for years to come.

My truck is so far gone that it has reached the point where I can freely mar it with bumper stickers. It has two. This is the first one.

Scott

Here is the second.

Scott

Priceless...

Scott:

I'll vote for you, as long as you don't make an Asimina of yourself...

Decumbent - From the looks of the back end of that truck it looks like you are backing over the tree trimming people who do this.

VV,

No guarantees on that, although I've given up making an Asimina of myself for Lent. If I can hold out for forty days, maybe I've made a breakthrough.

Snapple,

I've backed over a few, but going forwards is better. I've got a gunsight on my hood shaped like a goober with a chainsaw. I almost never miss. Oh, they make me chase them around sometimes, but usually they're not in the best of shape. I've also perfected a ramming tactic where I repeatedly bump a tree that's being topped until the goober with a chainsaw falls out. If I'm lucky, I can swing my truck around so he falls directly into the truck bed. Then I just go from there to the bridge where I dump them all in the river.

Scott

This message was edited Mar 3, 2007 7:01 PM

Decumbent: I don't believe you. In fact, since your truck is nearly worn out, I think you should get one of these things Sofer has. Then you could just suck the tree toppers up along with the tree toppings and compost them.


Kalispell, MT
(Zone 4b)

Mar 2, 2007
4:25 PM

Post #3242049

I am getting a "debris loader" which is a big vacuum that sucks up leaves, dirt, sawdust, manure, pine cones, pine needles, small sticks, paper, bark, ........ and grinds it up into smalish debris and blows it into the back of my pickup. Now I can go to the horse barn and suck up the cleanings, drive down the city streets and suck up leaves and soon have 40 to 50 yards of compost available each year for my garden. I can't wait. There is green and brown everywhere.
Ashes are neither because the carbon and most of the nitrogen have been combusted out of them. They are primarily calcium, potassium, magnesium, other trace minerals and a small amount of nitrogen. They are in a mineral mix which can increase the PH of soils so areas where it is already neutral (7 or Higher) it is not a good thing. I put a measured amount into my compost pile which is acidic (3cuyrds + 5 gallons of wood ash) because my soil is 6.5 to 6.9 here.

This message was edited Mar 3, 2007 6:54 PM

Oh I do.

I think if Spring does not get here soon all the tree-nuts will go nuts.

This message was edited Mar 3, 2007 7:24 PM

Waddya mean "go". Most are already.