When you think of yard maintenance, you probably picture the warmer months of the year. But with tree trimming, the best time to do it is during the winter months. Our team at Five Star Tree Services want to go over why you should wait to trim your trees in the winter.
Lower Stress on The Tree
All deciduous trees go dormant during the winter months. You can tell this in the fall when they start to drop their leaves in preparation for the winter months. When they do this, they essentially go to sleep for the winter. Which means when you are trimming or pruning them during this dormant/sleeping stage, it is less of a shock to their system and won’t negatively impact them as much. When you cut branches during the winter, there is less of a disruption to them getting their food, since they are sleeping. But if you trim or prune during active growth periods, this can trigger the tree to start aggressively growing where it has been cut. If this is done in the fall, right before it needs to go dormant, it leaves it vulnerable during the cold months. This happens because the new growth is not hard enough to withstand the winter.
Keep Diseases Away
Just like the trees themselves, diseases, infections, and infestation pests go to sleep for the winter. This makes it the perfect time to cut branches without fear of these things infiltrating your tree through the newly exposed wood. For example, oak trees are particularly susceptible to beetle infestations and oak wilt (which thrive in the warm months). This means in order for oak trees to be safe, winter tree trimming is a necessity.
Diseases are also dormant in the winter, meaning that they cannot spread from tree to tree from the transfer between pruning equipment.
Protect From Winter Damage
It’s no secret that winters in Toronto can be particularly harsh. It can include heavy snow, bad storms, and ice that can all do a lot of damage to trees, especially ones that are previously weak or have damaged limbs. Trimming your tree before bad storms happen and getting rid of dead weight on your trees is going to help protect them from additional damage and it’s also going to help protect you and your property as well. Trimming in winter also allows you to have a better view of the branches, since the foliage is gone. You can assess all the branches and find the ones that are weak, broken, or cracked and effectively get rid of them safely.
Not only are you protecting your trees when pruning in winter, you are protecting the ground surrounding your trees. Heavy equipment is needed to trim tall trees. With the ground being frozen, it is safer and easier to be on.
We do want to note that trimming when temperatures are far below freezing is not advisable. This is because in extremely cold temperatures, the wood can become brittle, which is not good for trimming. If you are unsure whether you can or should trim your tree, it’s safest to consult a professional arborist before doing anything.
Promote Healthy, Sustainable Growth
The objective of trimming or pruning a tree is not just for shaping and aesthetic purposes, but to help promote new growth in the spring. When you trim or prune in the winter, the tree is able to focus all its energy on this new growth when it wakes up in the spring, instead of it focusing on healing the exposed wood from the cuts. You will notice this in fruit trees in particular, as they will yield better quantities of fruit when pruned in the winter.
How Five Star Tree Services Can Help
Our team at Five Star Tree Services can help you with your winter tree trimming in Toronto! If this is something you are interested in, give us a call at (416) 990-3355!