Pinching conifers. Formation by trimming the crown of spruce. When and how to prune juniper

How to prune blue spruce

What is spruce pruning used for?

Pruning of any trees is divided into sanitary and forming. During sanitary pruning, we annually cut out dry and broken branches, and if necessary, thin out the crown to increase the light flux into the inside of the tree. Formative pruning, in particular for blue spruce, is carried out to obtain a denser and denser crown, as well as to obtain various decorative forms of the plant, for example, in the form of a cone, pyramid, cylinder or ball.

How to prune blue spruce

Pruning of spruces is carried out in early spring, before the buds swell, or at the end of June, after the end of the growth of current shoots. To do this, use a pruner or garden shears. In addition to trimming, there is a technique called pinching or tweezing. Pinching is used on non-lignified growing shoots, the operation is very laborious and time consuming.

It is important to note that if pruning is carried out within the specified time, then the plant has enough time to lay new buds and active growth points in the current season. In the event that the deadlines were missed, spruce pruning is possible, but new buds will appear only next year.

In order to stimulate the growth of new branches on the trunk of a blue spruce, it is necessary to cut the top of the tree, and subsequently pinch out the leader shoot. Without pruning the crown, it will be difficult to achieve new shoots and get a dense crown. It is checked up on own experience.

Below, in the photo, examples of pruning blue spruces are shown.

Trees vary in age and height. The owner of the site was not satisfied with the shape of the trees, and he asked to form a new crown for the plants.

The tops were removed and the first formative pruning of the crown was carried out.

In the future, blue spruces will begin to grow new skeletal branches, the crown will become more dense, and additional pruning will be kept at a given size.

If you are a fan of prickly beauties, but are afraid to place them in your own garden because they are too tall, forget about your doubts! Now you can adjust their sizes to your liking.

A familiar picture - a pretty Christmas tree has grown in the garden, but what to do with it? Looking at how decisively the baby took off into the sky in just a couple of years, we begin to doubt: are we really that lucky?

The growth rate in the forest and in the area where there is no competition is very different. The local climate also makes its own adjustments, therefore, the annual growth figures from different literary sources do not always coincide. Nevertheless, an ordinary forest Christmas tree, having reached a size of 2.5 m that is pleasant and “convenient” for a garden, will definitely not stop there, but will easily pull itself up another half meter over the next summer.

The larger the tree, the faster it grows. At a height of 4 m, the annual growth will be already 70 cm, and adult spruces in favorable conditions grow in height at a rate of up to 1 m per year. Not much time passes, and the spruce is already waving at you through the window on the second floor.

Often we realize that we are losing control of the situation when it is already too late. If a tree has grown too close to a house or a gazebo, not only its crown, which is disproportionate to the garden area, but also thick roots that penetrate under the foundation interfere.

Knowledge is power, and so it will give you more determination to implement the right decision at the right time.

First of all if you yourself decided to grow a spruce, choose decorative forms that are optimal for your site height. Shopping with "eyes" in the garden center is not allowed; before buying, you need to sort out the assortment in advance, finding out what height the seedlings you like in adulthood reach.

Compact conifers do not need a haircut- nature itself worked on their form.

If the Christmas tree has grown without your knowledge and you definitely want to keep it, first of all decide whether it is convenient for you to leave the tree in its original place. If not, hurry up to transplant the baby before she grows up. In the temperate zone, transplantation is possible in late April - early May or after August 20 if not too hot and dry. Make sure that the earthen ball does not fall apart during transplantation. To do this, pour the soil abundantly the day before. Watering will be required immediately after transplantation, and throughout the first year.

Important: spruces up to 1.5 m high take root best of all.

Secondly, you can "call to order" and wild spruce, although this will require effort on your part. Growth must be limited annual pruning without missing a single season. "Education" should begin at a young age, since a sharp "re-education", that is, a strong pruning of an adult spruce, only disfigures the tree. Sawing off the crown leads to the formation of a whole grove at the top: the branches remaining below the saw cut at the ends bend upward and grow as separate trees. At the same time, competition begins between them. In the end, one of the tops may win, which still does not solve the problem, since the familiar slender silhouette has already been lost forever.

Strongly cut side branches is also impossible., since the spruce has a “dead zone” under the green “fur coat” closer to the trunk, where the needles have fallen off for a long time, and new buds are not formed.

The easiest way- a simple haircut, in which the annual growth of all branches is evenly shortened. Cut off from 1/3 to 2/3 of the length of the shoot. At the same time, no more than 1/3 of the green mass can be removed in one haircut.

Turning a pine tree into a bonsai is not easy, but possible. If you are not confident in your abilities, you should consult with specialists.

Better than others, the “beauty standard” of a fluffy Christmas tree was studied by specialists from nurseries involved in growing Christmas trees. They argue that on the eve of the winter holidays, cone-shaped spruces with a crown height to base diameter ratio of 3:2 are in greatest demand among buyers. In other words, a Christmas tree of ideal proportions with a height of 1.5 m has a width of 1 m at the bottom. This is the kind of tree we like to dress up for the New Year. Of course, other proportions are possible, it is possible to form a crown both wider and narrower. However, if we deviate from the Christmas tree “ideal of beauty”, then, perhaps, in the garden a narrow crown is preferable for practical reasons. In autumn, during leaf fall, fewer leaves from nearby trees will settle on it. Other geometric shapes are not excluded, including a ball and a pyramid. Our spruce is wonderfully suitable for shearing and can successfully replace yews and thujas of southern latitudes.

Conifers react differently to pruning, so the timing of this procedure is different for them. If a by the pines shorten the young, fragile growth at the stage of “candles”, breaking them off manually, that is, approximately in the beginning or middle of June, then at the firs You can start pruning when the growth period is nearing completion, that is, at the end of summer. It is carried out at such a time that the cuts before winter have time to drag on. After the winter break, you can start pruning again in early spring - before the buds start to grow. Small Christmas trees can be formed not by pruning, but by pinching the blossoming light green “legs”, which, as in the case of pines, is done manually. In late May - early June, young shoots are tender and fragile, and no pinching tool is required.

To form larger specimens of spruce in the form of a simple cone, you will need hedge shears. But a more original method of cutting is also known, which is usually used on Christmas tree plantations. There, the branches are shortened with a sharply sharpened and very long knife. The worker with a swing cuts off the ends of the branches with this tool, like a saber, from top to bottom, often working with two hands alternately. From the outside, such a haircut of fir trees may resemble an intricate ritual dance.

A denser haircut is obtained when working with scissors, since the saber knife cuts only the tops of the branches, trimming the silhouette and making the crown a little more fluffy, more is not needed for the Christmas tree.

Christmas tree growers are interested in making trees grow faster. We need, on the contrary, restrain growth and therefore carry out deeper pruning. It, in turn, causes increased branching, which leads to the formation of a dense green "fur coat". True, the natural, tiered shape of the crown is lost in this case. But if you want to save it and cut the spruce, shaping it by analogy with bonsai, use secateurs and hand pinching, since each spruce leg is formed separately, pursuing two goals at the same time: to reduce growth, but at the same time preserve the natural form of growth characteristic of a tree. This pruning option requires skill, patience, accuracy and observation. Every year you evaluate the result of your last year's pruning and make adjustments.

Important:"Rusty" twigs must be cut immediately after they appear, regardless of the season.

It would seem, why such trouble with wild spruce? Although there is more work to be done than miniature stunted cultivars, nurturing a wild herringbone has its advantages. This is full compliance with local characteristics, high resistance to adverse conditions - frost and solar radiation. And high growth rate and vitality are very important for plants that are cut regularly. These qualities allow them to easily recover and continue to grow. Well, besides, artistic pruning of a tree is a creative activity, and if you have already mentally drawn yourself how you want to see your tree, each pruning will bring you closer to achieving your goal. Agree, this is much more pleasant than immediately purchasing a ready-made large-sized one.

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Our rather modest nature has given us a remarkably plastic material for garden creativity, which allows us to embody many intricate ideas. I mean the original Russian conifers that surround any garden - spruces and pines.

By their nature, these are huge trees; they can only be allowed to grow freely in a large area. But even for summer cottages of six acres, they will find a worthy and original application.

Let's start with the pines. With the help of simple tricks from Scots pine, you can create both a magnificent dense pillow (in the rock garden or outside it), and a garden bonsai, a miniature tree.

How about a pine hedge? Many of us have a chain link fence. A few pine trees along it and a dozen years will make it possible to turn such a fence into something fundamentally new. The author and implementer of the idea is Karel Lang, a Czech saxifrage collector.

Several techniques are used to form pines. Trunks for some time must be fixed in the desired position, for this, solid supports (well-stretched chain-link), plumb lines or wire are used. In the case of a chain-link, young, still flexible branches are fixed on it. Suspension of weights helps to bend thicker trunks down, and bends are formed by the superimposed lanyard. In principle, you can get by with one thing, if the tree is not quite old. Branches bend best in spring and June, during active sap flow and plant growth.

Important: the wire winding quickly cuts into the barrel, leaving ugly scars and sagging. It must be checked and weakened two to three times during the growing season. The same applies to all kinds of harnesses and loops.

When the branches and trunks are given the desired shape and fixed, another aspect becomes relevant - inhibition of growth. After all, our pine trees in their prime can produce growth of more than half a meter per year. Where can we talk about a small fence or bonsai. But there is an elementary trick that allows you to reduce growth and increase the fluffiness of pine by an order of magnitude. This is pinching shoots, or tweezing.

Surely you have noticed how pines begin to grow in spring: first “candles” appear, then they lengthen, and then needles begin to extend on them. It is these young candles that need to be plucked out. It is best to do this when they are already sufficiently extended, but the needles are still very short. This way you can more accurately calculate the "growth" that you leave to the pine tree, and not damage the remaining needles.

Someone does it with nails, someone with scissors. The shoots are very soft, easily cut, twisted or broken off. You can remove up to eighty percent of the length of the candle.

You need to be careful and process all the candles without exception, otherwise there will be disproportionately long young branches.

At the end of the pinched shoot next spring, a whorl of new, less powerful, with shortened needles is formed. You will need to do the same with them.

So: in the first spring we plant pine trees (taking the distance between the trees approximately the same as the height of the fence), in the second and, possibly, the third - we form a skeleton along the chain-link, from the third we start pinching. If the mesh is not completely tightened, it will be possible to “let go” some shoots without pinching them to fill in the empty spaces by growing branches of the desired length.

Over time, the pads of plucked branches become excessively dense, so every few years it will be necessary to thin them out, removing entire branches inside. This is done with a pruner so that there are no stumps left. Sections can not be glossed over: they are instantly tightened with resin.

Important: pine can bud only in those places where there are needles, best of all - on fresh growth. Pine trees categorically do not grow from a stump. Therefore, it is important not to miss the pinching time, which lasts all May.

If the amount of work scares you, then I can assure you that it takes about twenty minutes to pinch a pillow of pine the size of a square meter. Of course, the fence will require significantly more time, perhaps a whole day, but imagine that just one day of work a year - and such an amazing result!

Similar are the methods of working with spruce trees. Is that with them you can be a little more arrogant. Norway spruce is suitable for sheared hedges. And here you can already get by with scissors for these purposes. Shearing time is the phase of the most active growth of new branches. The most important thing is to remove the tops, the strongest shoots. And, of course, a haircut should be annual.

On a note: For a spruce hedge, seedlings must be planted quite spaciously so that the lower branches have room to develop. The distance must be at least 70 cm.

Spruces are also suitable for creating garden figures. I saw a stunning blue hemisphere in the garden of Jiri Balatka, a coniferous collector. For several decades, he has been pinching the prickly spruce "Glauka Globoza". The owner's fingers work here, but the tree looks flawless. The branches plucked at the same level even after the process itself look natural, the needles are not injured, unlike mechanical shearing.

Figures from spruce can be made using the features of its growth, whorl. These can be pyramids, umbrellas, cylinders, whatnots, etc.

For the formation of pines and firs in our climate, it is very important to do this in a bright place. Even with shading, the spruce hedge begins to be exposed from below, and this defect is almost impossible to eliminate.

Trees that are often planted and constantly found in unusual conditions would certainly be good to feed. It is worth forgetting about manure, but mineral fertilizers created specifically for conifers, with a low nitrogen content, will do.

The planting of coniferous hedges and shaped pines is done ... forever. To understand how the formation process takes place, and to “fill your hand”, it is better to first practice on one plant, perhaps a seedling outside the outskirts. I am mastering pinching on a mountain pine growing in my rock garden. In five years, it has turned into a compact, pretty pillow.

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Growing coniferous plants on the site involves not only feeding and watering, but also more complex manipulations. Spruce pruning is an important part of tree health and a good way to adjust the density and shape of its crown. But it’s not enough to distinguish between types of “haircuts”, you also need to know the rules for their implementation. How to prune a spruce tree? What scheme of cutting and crown formation is suitable for decorative subspecies? How to cut a spruce in the garden so that it grows up? These questions are of serious interest to beginner gardeners and lovers of original landscapes. If the conifers in the local area have grown and turned into indistinct shapeless plants, you should think about cutting as a radical measure of transformation.

The beauty of coniferous plants fascinates and attracts many owners of summer cottages or household plots. But as spruces grow, they also need the correct formation of the crown, stretching the silhouette to a perfect cone. If pruning is not carried out, the tree grows in width, gives many additional shoots, and even turns into a giant. In order for the crown to grow upward, it is not enough just to take good care of the spruce. Ideal New Year trees in nurseries are obtained through painstaking work, achieving a similar result is quite within the power of the owner of a country house working in the garden on his own.

Due to their slow growth, it is these trees that allow you to maintain the created crown line for as long as possible.

Nursery owners often prefer pinching rather than trimming plants. But in the case of a spruce on a personal plot, this work may be too laborious. Pinching involves the complete or partial breaking of young shoots, which significantly slows down the growth of plants. This can significantly complicate the further formation of the crown, but in a small area it may well replace sanitary pruning for young trees under the age of 3 years. Pinching is necessary if the tree is planned to be curly pruned in the future - so its needles will become as lush as possible.

Shearing fir trees is done with a pruner or a garden file. When pruning, the entire branch or part of the trunk that has been damaged or needs to be removed due to the wrong direction of growth is cut down. That is, in this case, more intensive sanitization is performed, while pinching simply eliminates the uncontrolled growth of the tree.

Decorative pruning carries even more functions and allows you to radically change the appearance of the plant. Pinching such a result will definitely not be achieved.

Many are interested in what timing is best to choose for pruning conifers. Spruce can be cut for sanitary purposes periodically, as the crown grows. But the older the tree, the more often it will have to be cut. For example, a tree 2.5 m in height in just a year will add about 0.5 m more. And a four-meter spruce will grow by 0.7–1 m. Of course, such dimensions are more typical for wild forest species. Cultivated ornamental varieties in the climate of the Russian middle zone often do not even reach 2 m.

The optimal time for cutting fir trees is the end of summer. In autumn, you can also trim, but in such a way that the cuts have time to drag on before the onset of winter cold. The next sanitization will wait for the tree in early spring, before bud growth begins. Young trees up to 3–5 years old are not cut, but pinched, removing tender shoots throughout the entire period of their growth, until early June.

There are basic rules and individual shearing schemes, with the help of which ordinary spruce easily turns into a tree with a spherical or spiral crown. The first pruning to form a crown can be carried out with a tree at least 3 years old. Spruce should grow to 0.5–1 m, in the future it will need to be cut, holding back the growth of the crown in height. To make a cone-shaped tree into a ball, you need to cut off the top shoots, stimulating lateral growth. So that the lower branches of the forest spruce do not dry out, exposing the trunk, you need to periodically cut off the apical processes. Young trees are mainly processed with garden shears. An adult spruce, which already has the desired shape, is cut with a brush cutter, no more than 1/3 of the shoots are cut at a time. At the initial stage, the length of one bud is manually removed along the entire crown, mainly in the upper part of the plant.

In order to correctly perform a decorative or curly haircut of fir trees on the site, to give them the desired shape, you should follow such general recommendations as:

• choose the right time - it is better to cut spruce in cloudy weather, on a non-hot day; under the scorching sun, the evaporation of moisture by the tree increases, and its needles can become brown;
• carry out preliminary sprinkling - wet needles are not so intensively dehydrated, easier to cut; in addition, there will be no risk of blunting the tool;
• perform the first treatment on time - it is carried out upon reaching the first year of the tree's life, after the completion of its acclimatization, it is performed by pinching, with additional sanitary pruning;
• when forming a topiary, take into account the natural shape, following the natural lines of the crown, it is possible to achieve an easier formation of a harmonious and long-lasting silhouette of the crown;
• remove 1/3 of the growth every season, which will allow you to form a dense lush crown in a short time;
• do not leave the branches bare - if the shoots are completely deprived of needles during pruning, they will not be able to continue their growth; the absence of dormant buds will lead to their drying out and death;
• protect eyes, hands, clothes - work in the garden must be carried out in compliance with safety requirements; a branch that has flown off can harm your eyesight or scratch it, and the resin is very poorly washed off from wardrobe items;
• use only sharp and clean tools - garden knives, scissors, pruners require sharpening, during work they must be wiped from moisture with a dry cloth, at the end of the procedure, the blades are treated with hot water and soap, dried thoroughly.

Do not cut during the resin flow period - if the tree begins to secrete resin abundantly, it has a period of active vegetation, at this time the haircut is not carried out.

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Everyone seems to love conifers. What is worth only a Christmas tree next to the house, which for the New Year can be decorated with a garland of shining light bulbs, or pine, and cedar.

In nature, these are large plants, so few gardeners allow them to grow as they grow. Conifers are given a shape (up to a multi-tiered fruit plate and lollipop), increase the splendor of the crown, limit growth, make impenetrable hedges out of them. Let's see how FORUMHOUSE users do it.

Pinching is a method by which a plant is shortened, kept within the desired height and made its crown more lush and dense. If a Christmas tree, including a blue one, can be cut off (although it is better to pinch), then it will only be right to pinch a pine tree.

Pinch and cut young shoots of a tree during active sap flow (in spring and early summer). So, pine candles pinch when they are already completely “advanced”, but the needles on them either have not yet appeared at all, or have just begun to bloom. Then the probability of making a mistake with the size of the removed part of the shoot is reduced to zero.

They unscrew “as much as necessary” from the shoots to implement the gardener’s design plans, the main thing is to make sure that at least one bud (for Christmas trees) and needles (for pines) remain. In order for the tree to bush more strongly and not particularly increase in size, the growth of the current year is pinched above the growth buds of the next year to the desired height.

The pinching technology is simple, especially with some skill:

• We take the shoot with the left hand, holding it between the thumb and forefinger;
• We unscrew the tip of the escape with the right hand.

This procedure awakens dormant kidneys. Next spring, a whorl of new shoots will appear in this place, which will again need to be pinched. Unnecessary shoots are twisted completely. Pruning will not be a full-fledged replacement for pinching, also because when the shoot is twisted, an oblique fracture line is obtained, and the upper kidney automatically becomes the leader. Then you don't have to create it.

If you need multi-barrels, then it's a different matter.

Make sure to pinch (or prune) all the candles, otherwise you will get unnecessary long branches on your conifer.

Here's how it's done Helga simple pruning of a simple Christmas tree (we see that the top of the plant is not touched yet):

After trying it, you will see that pinching blue spruce or any other takes less time than pruning with secateurs. Do not be afraid of resin on your hands - in young shoots it looks like juice and is easily washed off.

In smart books, it is advised to do it gradually, tiered, but who will wait!

This is how “very little” looked like, on one kidney with 2-4 rows of needles, a pinned shoot a year later: it gave powerful suppositories, bud formation went low, the whorl thickened along the entire length of the growth.

Shearing and pinching is usually applied to spruces and pines that have grown by self-sowing or were brought from the forest.

All the same, no matter how you pinch a pine from the forest, it will not look like a Pug.

But even free forest Christmas trees and pines can become a decoration of the site in the hands of a diligent gardener. Often successful solutions are obtained. Especially with Christmas trees - as already mentioned, this is a more hardy plant, like a pine tree, it grows faster, many resolutely cut this tree with pruners, give it the desired shape and get high splendor.

this Christmas tree Vasili.S60 brought from the forest at a very young age, and this is how she began to look after four years of cutting.

In this photo - a successful attempt to hide a toilet and a compost heap behind conifers.

For the formation of hedges, it is correct to use Christmas trees: they are more suitable for impenetrable hedges. Not necessarily blue: from ordinary plants "from a neighboring spruce forest" you can get a pretty, quite a decorative fence. So, betto33 planted Christmas trees on the border of his site, waited until they were out of childhood, and for several years he has simply cut them on top and sides. It turned out beautifully, another plus - we managed to completely fence ourselves off from the neighbors.

And here is a pine hedge formed by a neighbor Burenkina spring pinching.

A coniferous hedge is formed as follows: trees are planted in the first spring, the next two years are spent on the formation of a skeleton, when the trees reach the age of three, you can start pinching. With the adventitious formation of the skeleton, the trunks and branches of the tree are fixed in a certain position for some time. To do this, use either a solid support (a properly stretched chain-link is suitable), or a wire, or suspended loads. It is best to shape the tree in spring and early summer, at the time of active sap flow. Waldschnepfer advises to use not ropes, but hard wire. The S-shaped braces do not rot, do not pinch the branch and are easily adjusted by bending.

On this tree, everything except the last growth grows in the given directions. And it was brought from the thicket of the forest, the guide died several times, the branches were only on one side of the plant and hung with ropes. The trunk was leveled by the gardener, the branches were raised and deployed.

Polinka, FORUMHOUSE moderator, believes that planting material should be carefully selected for coniferous hedges. Some plants cannot be forced to be fluffy by any pinching, even turn inside out.

Conifers are good not so much in hedges, but in various compositions, in rock gardens, etc. In this case, they are always cut to shorten, and give some form. Look how unusually beautiful a pine tree, ordinary in all respects, can be!

Believe in practitioners and become practitioners, otherwise you will be deluded and afraid all your life!

Kruta pinches his pines every spring: according to the garden design plan, they should become 2-meter balls. In general, a pine tree begins to be formed into a ball when it grows to the height you need: the conductor (the part of the trunk on which there are branches of only the first order), cut off once, is no longer restored. To make the ball fluffy, young growth candles in the spring, even before the needles bloom, are cut off by a third or two-thirds. This can also be done in one go.

The cube can be formed using a folding frame in the form of the letter P. As soon as the plant grows to it according to some parameters (width, height, etc.) - it's time to cut. Pruning is carried out during the growth period. Having got the hang of it, you can give the coniferous the most amazing regular shape: a globe on a leg or a multi-tiered fruit plate. But…

If you are ready to spend the rest of your life on a stepladder, because then haircuts will need to be done annually to maintain the shape you have set, then go ahead. And the plant loses its shape without care very quickly and the sight is usually a sad one.

At evgenia for 25 years, a spruce in the shape of an ideal ball has been growing on an alpine hill. The shape was maintained by annual spring shearing, the young shoots along the outer contour were completely removed, and the inner shoots grew and created such a dense crown that the wagtail hatched chicks in it for several years in a row. Then the dacha had to be sold, and again the participant of our portal saw her Christmas tree only a few years later. Her former pride, which was no longer properly trimmed, looked like a disheveled broom.

FORUMHOUSE deals with various cases related to pinching and pruning of conifers, here you can get a recommendation from an experienced gardener. We offer you a video in which a specialist talks about how to choose coniferous seedlings and care for them. We offer you an article on how to care for conifers.

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Photo 1. During pruning spruce form a crown.

For the first time, a plant needs to form a crown during transplantation (Photo 1). The transplant procedure must be carried out very carefully so as not to damage a large number of roots.

Pruning of spruces carried out at the right time brings the size of the tree crowns in line with the remaining root system.

A young tree, properly formed in early life, will require minimal pruning in adulthood. Removing young, small branches is a fairly quick, simple procedure.

If you postpone work until the branches become large, they will be harder to cut. This will affect the health of the tree.

The best result is achieved by the formation of a young, strong tree.

Photo 2. Experts know how and at what time to prune fir trees.

It must be remembered that most spruces have a powerful central trunk and practically do not require shortening. The exception is when the plant needs to be given an unusual shape.

Pruning at planting time involves removing some cross branches or weak branches. Side stems should also be removed to achieve a strong, well-formed specimen (Photo 2).

An annual inspection of mature specimens will determine if pruning or any other tree maintenance is required.

Also, most conifers, under normal development conditions, do not require the removal or shortening of branches.

The exception is broken or crossing branches. If the tree was given proper care at the stage of its formation, they are not common. The size of large, old krupnomer can be controlled by removing part of the crown.

For species such as Great Fir, Weymouth Mountain Pine and Canadian Spruce, late winter or early spring is the best time to prune.

Live branches should not be shortened during the growing season - from late autumn to late summer. At this time, it is very easy to damage the bark - the risk of infection of the tree is very high.

In the case of Douglas fir (Photo 3), it is risky to shorten shoots larger than 4-6 cm in diameter due to this problem.

Pruning Canadian spruce, however, stimulates the production of resin, which helps protect the cut surface from fungal infection.

With some care, pruning of dry branches is carried out at any time of the year, even in summer or autumn. Such shoots are distinguished by a lack of green needles or the absence of living wood under the bark. With a knife, you can separate the top layer of bark and examine the wood underneath. If the tissues are dry, the branch is also dry.

Prices for pruning fir trees and their dry branches

the spruce should have enough green branches to lift the arborist.

* You can learn how to measure and determine the diameter of a tree trunk before carrying out work to determine their estimated cost from the article determining the diameter of a tree trunk.

plants. The main cutting zone is the young growth of plants, it is this that we shorten during formation.

• dotted - cutting each individual new shoot onto a bud formed on it. This method is used at the beginning of the formative shearing, when there are still few shoots and in places where few shoots grow, for example, at the top of the plant.
• Blind haircut - cutting all new shoots (young growth of this year) with curb scissors, a brush cutter, regardless of the location of the kidneys. This is how hedges, coniferous and deciduous plants with a well-formed dense crown are cut.

When choosing a haircut shape, you should try to maintain a natural shape for this type or close to it. The natural form is much easier to maintain than the form unusual for the plant.

Thuja Kornik After haircut

It is best to trim on a cool, overcast day to reduce evaporation from the cuts. Intense evaporation leads to the formation of brown dried tips. To reduce evaporation, sprinkling of the crown can be carried out before cutting conifers. Wet needles are easier to cut and the tool is less blunt.

It should be remembered that many conifers are poisonous, for example, arborvitae, Cossack juniper, so it is necessary to protect hands from contact with needles. Scratches on the hands take a long time to heal.

After shearing, the plants must be shed. It is possible to carry out spraying on the crown using stimulants, for example, "", "Emistim", "HB-101", etc.

Haircut on the young growth of the thuja maintains its shape, makes the thuja more dense and even. But you need to start not with a haircut, but with cleaning inside the crown. Old needles accumulate and can become a source of fungal diseases, so all the accumulated needles must be removed - combed out and collected crumbled

The old thuja needles must be combed out

If the thuja is multi-stemmed, it is necessary to tie the trunks, cut the dried branches. As experience shows, the best material for binding are women's elastic tights, they stretch and do not put pressure on the trunks

Thuja shoots are tied from the inside

Such a strapping should be checked at least once every 2 years to make sure that the trunks are not overtightened. Tying multi-stemmed thujas saves the plant from winter breaks due to snow and icing. The trunks are connected along the entire height in several places.

Now that all the preparatory work has been completed, you can start cutting.

At the initial stage, as well as when cutting complex shapes, we use secateurs and curb scissors

Haircut of young growth of thuja with curb scissors

If the thuja is not formed for the first time and the crown is dense, a brush cutter can be used to cut large surfaces. The use of a brush cutter makes it easier to cut hedges from arborvitae, giving plants a columnar, pyramidal, spherical shape

Haircut spherical thuja with a brush cutter

Haircut columnar thuja with a brush cutter

Mature plants sometimes lose their shape. So, for example, thuja Ericoides was sheared for a long time with a ball. But after the winter, every year the form did not recover for a long time, the shoots of this thuja are very soft. Therefore, I had to change the shape of the haircut and emphasize the collapsed ball. Now this haircut is called "living stones"

Thuja Ericoides before shearing

Thuja Ericoides haircut Living stones

To carry out a curly haircut, you need to outline the line of intended cuts with a cord, spray-paint for flowers (painted needles will be cut off) or something else, so as not to make a mistake and cut it accidentally in the wrong place. Standing next to the plant, it is easy to go astray from the plan, so you need to step back and look at the result of the haircut "from the side."

After cutting with a brush cutter, stumps may remain that spoil the view. We carefully remove them with secateurs.

Removing stumps after cutting

Juniper shearing is usually aimed at curbing growth, as junipers grow quickly and occupy an area not intended for them. This applies to juniper horizontal, Cossack, middle, Chinese. Incorrectly planted junipers have to be cut. Juniper Pfitzeriana planted close to path had to be trimmed in style (garden bonsai)

Pfitzeriana juniper haircut

We select several well-placed shoots. We clean the trunks of excess branches, leaving only the shoots at the top, slightly shortening them. Then every year we shear young growth.

Common juniper responds well to a light haircut of young growth. The crown becomes denser and more easily tolerates snow piles in winter. In our climate, junipers should not be cut short in late summer, as the plant will not have time to prepare for winter.

Common juniper haircut Bruns

Spruce ordinary perfectly tolerates a haircut. A haircut can limit the height of the plant, for example, prevent it from growing above a meter. To do this, every year, 1 or 2 times per season, we cut the young growth, removing up to 2/3 of its length. The cut must be made on one of the buds laid on the young shoot

Haircut of young growth of common spruce on the kidney

If you leave a stump over the kidney, it will gradually dry out. When the spruce is dense, with a large number of shoots, it will be possible to cut it with a brush cutter, not paying attention to the buds.

Prickly spruce also responds well to shearing. Species spruce prickly haircut makes slim and dense

Haircut of young growth spruce prickly on the kidney

Prickly spruce Glauca Globosa grows quickly, which also makes it necessary to resort to a haircut

Prickly spruce haircut Glauca Globosa

By shearing we support the already existing form of the plant by cleaning the spruce stem

We clear the trunk of spruce from the lower branches

Larch is well cut both European and Japanese. This year's growths are easily shortened with curb shears. It is easy for young larches to give the necessary shape and then maintain it with an annual haircut.

Japanese larch haircut

In recent years, larches were subjected to fungal diseases, so their growth was greatly inhibited. Intense shearing is also not conducive to the health of the tree. It is better to abandon the idea of ​​\u200b\u200brestraining the growth of specific larches with a haircut, now there are many undersized varieties.

Unlike conifers, it is necessary to cut deciduous trees more often, on average once a month, i.e. 3-4 times per season. cut derens, mock oranges, willows, vesicles

Bubble before shearing

Bubble after shearing

White turf haircut

Willow creeping to shear

creeping willow after shearing

The results of the formation of deciduous trees, which we carried out at the beginning of the month, are already visible.

Field maple overgrown after formation

Willow brittle after rejuvenating pruning

The heat that happened in June this year does not allow for a full-fledged pruning of the western thuja, we are waiting for the temperature to drop and rain to come. The result will be published in July.

Often, many gardeners and lovers of coniferous trees eventually have questions about pruning. And since blue spruce Hupsi is very popular, such questions are much more often related to this fluffy, bluish coniferous plant.

Can I prune blue spruce (or prickly) Hoopsy? When to cut? How exactly to cut? Etc…

You will now receive the simplest and most comprehensive answers to all these questions.

Blue spruce Hupsi in adult form reaches about 15 meters in height and 5 meters in diameter. Therefore, determine in advance for her a place where she will grow and not interfere with other plants.

And if it really happened that you didn’t know the adult parameters of eating Hupsi and landed her in the wrong place, then you need to decide - or transplant, or do formative pruning .

Most spruces can be pruned, including Hupsi spruce. Pruning is of two types - forming and sanitary. As a rule, in good nurseries, such as Ecoplant, be sure to do mostly sanitary pruning. Formative pruning is an individual matter and each owner chooses the formation of the crown to his liking.

Sanitary pruning consists in the annual spring viewing of the crown and cutting out dry, broken, crooked branches that are knocked out of the crown shape. We also remove excess thickening and weaving of branches. This is to increase the luminous flux inside the crown and for ventilation - the prevention of fungal diseases. So the blue Hupsi spruce will grow neat, healthy, the shape of the crown will have a natural, pyramidal appearance.

Formative pruning takes longer and must be carried out periodically in order to constantly maintain the correct shape of the crown. It also leads to the growth of new shoots with fluffy branches - this is how we make the Hupsi spruce lush, but not thickened. It will not be just a pyramidal Christmas tree with some protruding, short branches, but a clear and very even, beautiful shape. Designers of a regular style or high-tech style, for example, love such classics.

You can set any form, but you do not need to go beyond. Basically, gardeners like the standard pyramidal shapes, as well as cylindrical, elongated oval, spiral, spherical.
The general rule for cardinal pruning is no more than 1/3 of the part. That is, if you are going to make a clearly pyramidal shape, and even so that the Christmas tree looks slender, narrow, then you can cut off all the branches only by 1/3 part or less. Otherwise, the tree will lose a lot of strength to restore growth.

What to do if you need to cut off the top of the Hupsi spruce?
There are cases when the Hupsi spruce on the same land and with one care grows more slowly and in adulthood reaches a smaller size than the one that feels chic with caring owners.
Or what to do if they said that the height will be the same, but the tree keeps growing and growing? It happens, but there's nothing to worry about.

Usually blue spruce Hupsi grows up to 15 meters in height and 5 meters in width. And if the spruce simply cannot grow so high due to various obstacles - a roof, wires ... Of course, if it's not too late, then transplant the tree. Early spring is the best time to transplant. But there is another way - a ball!

Yes, you will have to form a spherical or oval crown. Spring is also an active period for shearing, shaping most conifers! And this must be done BEFORE the kidneys swell. If you are late, then we carry out the next haircut at the end of June - after the full disclosure of the current shoots.

At such times, the Hupsi spruce still has time to lay and grow new shoots that will delight you this year. If you missed it in June, but you need to! - form at any time, only new buds and shoots will be next year!

Your task is to grow the Hupsi spruce to the height you need and pinch or cut off the top.

In the photo, after cutting the top of the Hupsi spruce, new buds began to wake up and new shoots grow!

Disinfect the garden shears and cut off the top of the crown of the Hupsi spruce at a time. If the trunk is coarsened, a garden saw with small teeth will go into action. There were such cases that they cut off up to 1.5 meters of the top.

After that, note that new side shoots will grow along the entire height of the trunk.

And at the very top, a new shoot will climb - a leader who will try to replace what was cut off - we are all reaching for the sun!

This new shoot will need to be pinched. And so it is necessary to restrain each leading apical shoot, which will wake up after pinching the previous one. It looks like another small, young branch, but the lead is noticeable - a little more elongated upwards. Here, take it by the top and pinch it with your fingers or cut it off with scissors.

So, if you cut the top of the blue Hupsi spruce, then the tree will more and more acquire a spherical or oval shape, the crown will be beautiful, dense, dense. In the future, it will only be necessary to pinch the leading shoots and cut off some side shoots, giving a beautiful shape to the crown.

Open cuts and wounds after trimming are not smeared with anything. Coniferous trees heal themselves by releasing healing, volatile resin onto the wound. After pruning, it is advisable to treat the needles with Epin's solution. It is a plant growth regulator and will improve the growth of new shoots.

Video Formation of the top of the spruce:

Video Haircut spruce and prickly:

How to prune evergreens?

Pruning conifers or how to properly form a crown. How to properly form tui?

spruce pinching. Create the desired shape (video)

The video describes how to create a decorative form from ordinary spruce.

Consider a spherical spruce. This tree is about 4-5 years old.

Under normal conditions, the spruce would already be quite tall and had a pyramidal shape, but thanks to pinching, we were able to form a spruce into a spherical, fairly low, compact and fluffy Christmas tree.

Consider how to achieve this effect and make a spherical shape of spruce from an ordinary one with your own hands.

It can be seen that the spruce has grown young needles.

New shoots can be cut with scissors, but I do not advise you to do this, as you can damage the needles. The cut ends will brown and the spruce will not look aesthetically pleasing. What needs to be done. It is necessary to pinch off the tips of young shoots by about 2/3. In some areas, if there are bald spots, you can leave the process intact or pinch a small part of it. Thus, let the branch grow and fill the space we need with greenery. To give a spherical shape, pinching must be done on all young shoots.

The procedure is quite laborious, but by doing so we will have a nice and fluffy spruce. The procedure is repeated 2 times a year. You can create not only a spherical shape, but also other forms of spruce. To give a standard form, it is necessary to let the spruce grow, then remove the lower branches, then form a crown on the trunk using the method described above.

Experiment, do not be afraid to pinch conifers. Submit your work to the site!

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Conifers now - at the height of fashion, they are in almost every garden. And many of us are not averse to cutting and plucking Christmas trees and pines with our own hands, creating the desired shape of the crown. We asked an experienced professional, the head gardener of the Pharmaceutical Garden Anton Dubenyuk, to instruct enthusiasts: when to pinch, how and whether it is worth taking on this responsible task?

An important feature of conifers, which should certainly be taken into account, is the apical type of shoot growth. It is he who creates the characteristic correct silhouette of the crown. The main continuation shoot always grows from the uppermost (central), well-developed bud. Therefore, we cannot simply shorten the branch when pruning next year. Recovery buds usually form in a dense group around the central bud, forming a characteristic whorl, and only occasionally along the length of the shoot. The general rule is that on mature wood of a perennial branch, restoration buds no longer germinate. Therefore, usually a branch of a coniferous plant dries up to a branching node (below the whorl located) with a full-fledged branch. From this fact we should proceed.

The secret detour in the formation of woody conifers is to pinch the growing shoots. While the young shoot is not lignified, and the needles continue to grow, their axillary buds are not yet suppressed and are able to form well for the formation of the next year's shoot. Thus, the gardener has the opportunity to get shoots of the planned length, to stimulate (or stop) the growth of branches in the right direction.

This technique of minimal intervention is especially important if you need to correct the shape of the crown of a young plant. Just two or three movements allow us to remove unnecessary shoots and avoid painful pruning in the future. By removing or shortening the most powerful shoots, we have a chance to grow a more compact and dense plant than it would be without our intervention.

The most grateful objects for shaping: pines, spruces, larches, partly fir and pseudo-hemlock. We have two methods at our disposal: pinching or shearing. The right choice can only be based on an individual approach. For example, if the number of shoots in a plant is too large, as in shrub forms, pinching becomes too time-consuming and ineffective. Therefore, for a thuja, juniper or yew, a classic haircut is more suitable.

And now about pinching. The simplest and fastest bringing visible results - solid pinching tips of growing shoots or breaking out of awakening central buds in early spring. It's just like a haircut. In this case, all shoots are pinched, and if necessary, the main buds in whorls are removed. In this case, instead of one long shoot of continuation, several shorter branches grow from the rudiment of the whorl where the central bud has been removed. This creates more compact and dense plants with an even crown shape, for example, dense "balls" from whole coniferous trees or on their individual branches.

However, before moving on to technology, I advise you to take an individual approach to yourself: is it worth taking on this business at all? With today's variety of conifer varieties, it may make more sense to simply pick a variety that meets your requirements. There are many compact dense varieties that do not need painstaking shaping. Remember that with a long break or cessation of care, all the work will go down the drain and, most likely, nothing can be fixed, the decorative effect will sharply and irrevocably decrease. Without fear, you can only influence young plants with active growth, directing the energy of the tree to increase the number of shoots. In this case, as the crown grows and the annual growth decreases, the plant itself will establish the correct balance of growth.

On the other hand, having mastered the principles and techniques of pinching, you can begin to work with complex crown shapes.

The most impressive results can be seen in Japanese gardens, where pines and cryptomeria are found, which have been pinched every year for many decades. The Japanese work most often with fairly large trees, giving them fantastically beautiful shapes. Maintaining such plants requires a huge amount of labor and high skill. A team of gardeners can hang high above the ground for days on end and methodically pluck buds, shorten shoots, guide and tie branches to supports. Are you ready to follow their example? Of course, you can just buy garden bonsai, which still look like a rare and wasteful miracle in our gardens. They say that the process of creating bonsai is mesmerizing. So maybe it's worth the risk? Of course, you will have to be patient, but sooner or later a tree will appear that bears the imprint of the personality of the master who created it. It will be the pride of the whole family.

What you need to know to get garden bonsai blanks? First you need to choose the form you will strive for. I'll give you three possible options.

Curved trunk. To obtain a beautifully curved trunk, the apical shoot is partially removed (shortened). In this case, the buds are often laid along the length of the remaining part of the shoot, without forming a characteristic whorl with symmetrically arranged branches. In the future, only well-located buds are left with some margin, and at the beginning of growth, some of the best shoots (usually growing in the right direction, but not central ones) are left to grow intact, the remaining ones are greatly shortened over the next 2-3 years, gradually clearing them crown, cutting into a ring. This is done just to create an openwork crown with beautifully curved branches that are clearly visible.

Extended form. For this form, bonsai leave one of the side branches and pinch the rest, inhibiting their growth, but not removing them until the stem has gained sufficient thickness in the opinion of the gardener.

Umbrella. For a small garden, one of the best formations is the umbellate. And, I emphasize, not a grafted weeping form, but created on the spot. It is especially effective in Scots pine. In this case, you need to form a vertical stem without large branches. For this, one central shoot is left intact for several years, protecting it from damage. It must be tied to a support to protect it from breakage by birds and treated with insecticide against pests. All lateral shoots in the whorl are shortened, and the competitors to the leader must be broken off, preventing large branches from forming.

In this case, all the energy of growth goes up, but the trunk does not remain without food and also grows in thickness. Upon reaching the desired height, usually 2.5-3 meters (for free movement of people under a tree), the central bud is immediately broken out and a crown is formed from symmetrically located radial shoots. In this case, the main task for the next few years is to achieve dense branching in the horizontal plane. It is only necessary to take into account that over time the branch will become heavier and itself will lean down. In fact, the gardener simply accelerates the appearance of the characteristic umbrella-shaped crown of an adult pine.

From the point of view of plant physiology, the best moment for shortening the shoots comes at the beginning of their lignification, when the shoot itself is juicy and dense, like a fresh cucumber, and the needles have already moved out of the sheath, but have not yet stopped growing. In this case, at the bases of several needles that have become upper, replacement buds quickly form, and the wound at the top of the shoot is covered with resin and quickly overgrows. It's usually calendar second half of May. Technically, it is best to simply break off the top of the shoot, bending it over your finger, as if breaking a pencil.

It must be remembered that the needles live from 2 to 5 years, and if they are shortened or damaged during pruning, the tops of the shoots will not look very neat for a long time, the tips of the needles will turn yellow. That is why the breakout is preferable. If, nevertheless, a pruner is chosen for pinching (tweezing), then you should use a tool with the narrowest blades or garden shears. The blades of the tool should be tried to stick between the growing needles. When removing an entire shoot, it is best to do this as soon as possible. It is optimal not to let the shoot develop at all, by breaking out an unnecessary bud in the spring before the shoots begin to grow. In this case, you need to firmly grasp the kidney with two fingers and unscrew it from the plant. Unnecessary side buds easily break off with a simple side pressure. Soft shoots that have already begun to grow break out even more easily.

In the first or second season after planting, due to problems with survival, the shoots of coniferous plants may have uncharacteristic sizes and the advisability of additional intervention should be carefully weighed. However, when planting young medium-sized plants from a container, you can start shaping immediately.

If you grow conifers on the site, then you need to properly care for them. The appearance and growth rate of the plant depends on this. This article will cover the basic rules and technology for pruning blue spruce.

The main purposes of circumcision

There are several main purposes for blue spruce pruning:

1. Removing damaged and dry branches from, which take too much nutrients and provoke a slowdown in the development of coniferous crops.
2. Rejuvenation of adult plants.
3. Providing the necessary nutrition to the branches. Pruning also improves the penetration of air into the tree.

Important!If you cut the plant too late, they can slow down in development and lose their beautiful shape.

The best time

You can determine the optimal time for trimming fir trees using the technology of actions. Sanitary work can be carried out at any time of the year, if necessary. Most often, the procedure is carried out when a broken or damaged branch poses a threat to animals or people.

Other types of pruning are carried out at the following times of the year:

• spring is considered the best time for crown formation. It is necessary to carry out work before the start of sap flow in the kidneys, that is, in late March or early April;
• to remove shoots and branches that are knocked out of the general structure of the crown, the best time is summer (mid or late July).

Step-by-step instruction

If you start pruning conifers, in particular blue spruce, you need to cut no more than 1/3 of the green mass. If the plant is healthy, then it will be able to recover quickly enough. It is better not to touch sick and weakened plants, as they will not have time to grow needles by winter.
It is important to choose the right tools to cut coniferous crops: secateurs, scissors or a hand saw.

In order not to harm the trees, it is necessary to treat garden tools with disinfectants (alcohol, manganese or hydrogen peroxide). Follow the step-by-step instructions so as not to provoke a violation of the structure of the crown or the growth rate of the needles.

Topping

Quite often, gardeners resort to pinching to make the crown of a tree more lush and dense. The procedure must be carried out at the beginning of summer, when the growth of young shoots stops.

Important!If the pinching is carried out too late (at the end of summer), then new buds will not have time to appear before the onset of frost, so they will form only in the spring.

The pinching procedure is as follows:

1. Completely break off part of the candle.
2. Cut small branches with a pruner.
3. Remove large ones with a hacksaw or garden file.

Shoots must be cut carefully so that dormant buds are not damaged. From them, new shoots will appear. On healthy trees, at the base of the cut branch, about 3 shoots are formed.

Formation

It is customary to begin the formation of blue spruce in the middle of summer. If work is carried out in late autumn or winter, then the place left after cutting the branches will be affected by severe frosts and suffer. Most likely, crown growth will stop. Most often, crown formation begins when the top of the tree is damaged.

The step-by-step booking procedure is as follows:

1. Remove the top to a developed side branch.
2. Tie a tight rail to the trunk, with which you can straighten the top. This will allow her to constantly be in an upright position.

Video: blue spruce formation

Sanitary pruning

If you want to help the plant develop better, then it is necessary to carry out sanitary pruning. Trees should be regularly inspected for damaged or weak branches and removed in a timely manner. If this is not done, then the trees will be affected by fungal infections. This is due to the fact that part of the blue spruce is in an open state, where various viruses and bacteria can freely enter.

Did you know?Blue spruce needles were used by the navigator Cook to create a potion against scurvy. This is due to the fact that it contains a large amount of vitamin C.

The procedure for sanitary pruning is as follows:

1. Take a close look at the tree.
2. If broken or diseased branches were found, then they must be carefully cut with a saw.
3. There is no need to process the cut points, since coniferous crops emit resin, which will create an airtight coating.

Care after a haircut

After the blue spruce, you need to properly care for it. The quality and rate of tree restoration depends on this. First of all, watering and fertilizing should be adjusted. You should also support coniferous culture with growth stimulants.

Feeding and watering

Watering blue spruce after pruning is necessary by sprinkling. That is, water must be poured not only under the root, but also on the crown. Watering is carried out evenly. Spruce does not tolerate waterlogging and drought. At least 40 liters of water are poured under each plant. Watering interval - 3 weeks. You should also use strong growth stimulants so that the plant recovers before frost. On the crown you need to pour "Epin" (50 g per 10 l of water), and under the root - "Zircon" (30 g per 10 l of water).

Top dressing is applied only at the end of October in order to increase the frost resistance of a weakened tree. To do this, use a strong solution of superphosphate (100 g per 10 liters of water). The entire volume is poured under each plant.

Mulching and loosening the soil

As an additional protection against frost, the soil is mulched. To do this, lay out a 15-centimeter layer of straw, fallen leaves or sawdust. Additionally, it is not required to cover the top layer of soil with anything, since needles fall in autumn, which creates protection.

Did you know?The blue spruces that grow near the Kremlin were brought to Russia from North America.

So, now you know how to properly prune your blue spruce so that it grows thick and lush. All procedures must be carried out at the optimum time. This allows the culture to recover and not be affected by strong and dangerous diseases.

Cultural cultivation of coniferous plants involves constant care for their health and beauty. Pruning pine and spruce is a useful operation that has a positive effect on the condition of the tree.

Why cut pine and spruce?

There are several types of pruning popular conifers.

• Sanitary pruning.

This is the most common way to help a plant. Broken, weak and damaged branches are regularly removed. They pose a danger to the plant itself, as they sometimes cause fungal diseases. Such branches can break off and damage surrounding objects or people nearby, especially in strong winds or other adverse natural phenomena. Sanitary pruning can be done on a large specimen if the tree will shade the area too much. In this case, the lower branches are completely removed - after that, other plants can be planted with pine.

• Rejuvenating haircut.

It is carried out on an adult pine and spruce with a large number of bare and dry branches to stimulate the growth of new shoots.

• Decorative pruning.

The most popular type. The procedure is carried out on coniferous trees, which act as a hedge, and when grown using the bonsai technique. When cultivating pine and spruce in their usual form, regular pruning is also carried out. The procedure improves the shape of the crown, and, if necessary, inhibits the growth of the tree, which is especially important for tall varieties.

When is work done?

Sanitary pruning is carried out at any time of the year. Work is carried out urgently if an emergency occurs, for example, a large branch is broken and poses a threat to surrounding people, animals or buildings.

In the spring they form a crown, create a compact top and give the pine and spruce a decorative look. The time of spring pruning depends on climatic and weather conditions.

Young shoots of the current year are called candles. Work is carried out when they reach their maximum size, but the needles have not yet begun to bloom. This usually happens in June.

In summer, it is appropriate to prune young shoots that extend beyond the crown. In young plants, extra branches can be removed until the end of summer. It is not recommended to do this later: before the cold weather, the cambium does not have time to stand out, which “heals” fresh wounds.

Anti-aging haircut is carried out in the fall. The main growth zone is located at the ends of pine and spruce shoots, so over time, old trees lose their lower leaves and lose their attractiveness. They cut off the ends on the bare old shoots, leaving part of the needles on them. In spring, dormant buds will wake up on shortened shoots and new young branches will grow.

Pruning in late autumn and in winter is not recommended: cuts become vulnerable, wood may freeze.

The result of pruning depends on the condition of the tree. A healthy and vigorous plant will tolerate the procedure easily. In a very weakened pine or spruce, dormant buds may not wake up, so work is not carried out on such a plant.

Features of crown formation

A coniferous tree is a wonderful decoration for any garden. Along with Scotch pine (green), varieties with a grayish, silvery and even yellowish tint of needles have become widespread. With regular pruning, the decorativeness of the tree increases without worsening its general condition.

Pine and spruce pruning tactics depend on the growing method. The work required differs depending on whether the plant has the traditional form of a common downy tree, is used for hedges, or is cultivated in the Japanese style. Each pruning has its own goal, the main task is to imagine in advance what result should be obtained.

• Traditional form.

In many coniferous trees, a beautiful crown is formed independently. For example, it usually does not need pruning, acquiring a dense evergreen hat with age.

With the help of decorative pruning, a tree can be given an original shape. A beautiful pyramid, a flat hemisphere, a cone or a cylinder - the option depends on the skill and imagination of the author, as well as on the type of wood. You can create coniferous masterpieces in the form of animals and people, but only very skilled craftsmen can do such work on spruce and pine trees.

More often, the usual planned pruning is carried out, its scheme depends on the desired shape and condition of the plant. Only trees older than two years can be subjected to such a procedure.

• Hedge.

When growing pine in the form of a living coniferous hedge, pruning is carried out annually. The top is removed for the first time when the plant reaches the required height. This will stimulate the growth of side shoots and reduce the gaps between adjacent specimens.

• Nivaki style.

This is the Japanese art of cultivating garden trees and is often used in the cultivation of pine and spruce. It differs from the bonsai style known to many in the way it is grown. "Bonsai" - "a tree on a tray", and the roots of nivaki are not limited to a small pot, but develop in freedom, directly in the garden. Depending on the style of nivaki, pine or spruce is formed in different ways. For example, as a straight tree with a triangular crown shape or at an angle to the ground. Monkaburi is an original way of shaping pine. At such a tree, one very long horizontal branch is left, which is located above the entrance to the garden. In Japanese monasteries and temples, old niwaki-style pine trees are especially revered.

To create a tree in this technique will take a lot of time and effort, it is a long and painstaking process. They are determined with the desired height of the plant, regularly remove the "extra" branches and form a crown. New shoots annually need to be shortened by more than half their length. Creating a pine or spruce in the style of nivaki consists of pinching candles, removing some of the needles and cutting. This is a creative process, each plant needs an individual approach.

Pine emits a lot of fragrant amber resin. After pruning, the tree heals its wounds on its own with this bactericidal substance. All work should be carried out with gloves, because the resin is difficult to wash. The cut does not need additional processing with preparations.

How to cut?

A disinfected tool is used to carry out the work. Depending on the age of the tree and the thickness of the branches, a pruner, garden shears, a small hacksaw or a file are used.

There are several types of pruning.

• thinning.

Remove poorly located branches that spoil the appearance of pine or spruce. In a too dense crown, over time, some of the shoots die off due to insufficient sunlight. Too close neighboring branches can damage each other. Timely thinning helps prevent such problems.

Before work, they inspect the tree, remove the unnecessary branch completely. The cut point is made short. They try to process it with a knife so that there is no hemp left.

• Pinching.

This method helps to form a denser and fluffy crown of the plant. It is carried out when young shoots stop growing at the beginning of summer, and the needles are already beginning to separate from the stem. During pinching, part of the candle is partially or completely broken out.

Small branches can be cut with a sharp pruner, and large ones with a garden file or a hacksaw. Remove parts of the shoots carefully so as not to damage the dormant buds, from which new shoots will appear in the future. At the base of a truncated branch, 3-4 new strong shoots usually appear, on weak plants there may be fewer of them. The crown becomes fluffy, acquires a rounded shape.

With a late pinching (end of July - August), the kidneys do not have time to form in the current season. They will appear only next spring.

• Pruning.

This is the most common way to change the appearance of a pine or spruce. When pruning, part of the tree trunk is removed. The operation is performed on both young and adult specimens.

The young tree quickly stretches, adding about 15 cm annually. If desired, an adult Scots pine over thirty years old can be formed up to two meters high with the help of proper pruning. In nature, such plants grow above 10 meters.

The pruning scheme for pine and spruce is due to the apical type of growth of these plants. After removing the upper part, it will periodically be necessary to remove the remaining neighboring shoots: they tend to replace the removed top over time, tend to take up a vertical position. On mature wood, dormant recovery buds do not germinate, so plant formation begins at a young age.


Trimming Tips

1. For one haircut, no more than a third of the green mass of the plant is removed.
2. Work is carried out regularly, long breaks or cessation of pruning will spoil the result of previous work.
3. Trimming pine and spruce begins at a young age, when it has a compact shape.
4. When pinching, they usually remove up to 2/3 of the growth. During pruning, 1/3 of the branch is removed.
5. The first year after planting, coniferous plants adapt and take root in a new place; additional intervention will not benefit.

Care after the procedure

Pine and spruce are undemanding to soil quality, humidity and temperature. The mode of watering and fertilizing after pruning does not change. It should be remembered that frequent and thoughtless haircut weakens the plant and can cause various diseases. The main task is to carry out the work correctly and in a timely manner.

The coniferous beauty will thank you for your care with a neat appearance and excellent health. She will delight you with an elegant evergreen crown for decades.