pruning eucalyptus robustas

Joshua Rugg

does anyone have advice for pruning eucalyptus robustas. i picked up an account that has a wind break line of robustas with trunk spacing of 10 feet between each trunk. my question is how well do they respond to heavy pruning? what should be avoided with this species?

Eric Frei

Sounds to me that they're thinking of lopping/topping them?

Response depends on each trees vitality and enviro conditions.

The species has deadwood and epicormics naturally, I'd say if over 50% of foliage is removed in any single pruning event it wont die but it will become a problems with poor compartmentalization and epicormics with regrowth failing down the track.

Not the best to heavily prune.

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Steve Tipton

Eric is right, they blow apart ofter lopping.

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Heightmaster

Joshua Rugg

i definitely do not "top" trees. that is not within my nature and if i started topping trees it would muddy my name as an arborist following the ISA, TCIA and the ANSI code of ethics. im kinda irritated by how much topping happens here in hawaii. it has no end no matter how far you take it or fight it. no one seems to care, not even the state. :/

derail over.
they are asking me if i can do a height reduction on a few of them. becuase they have a ton of roots visible on the surface. from what i remember about certain eucs is that some have shallow root plates. that makes me nervous when doing a 30% height reduction because it may shift the weight of the tree and cause it to flop over in a gust of wind. there is alot of dead wood in the lower canopies but thats normal for most trees. im planning on selectively removing some of the upper 30% of the canopy. they are verry large trees i may add. the canopies seem to have all grown together in the line of these trees and the roots are probably growing in a symbiotic relationship with each tree. so besides the normal deadwooding and crossing/competing branch pruning there will be at max 30% of the conopies removed to reduce height.

Eric Frei

The common name is Swamp Mahogany.

Surface roots are typical.

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Joshua Rugg

thanks eric. and i will be in the newcastle area to do some church work for a couple of months. know any good tree crews in that area that might wanna hire a climber for the winter?

Eric Frei

Pickup the local paper and Yellow Pages and ring them, tell them you're in town and available. I reckon for every one on the net there's 5 more that are not, and bugger all of them on a forum.

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