How To Repair A Broken Tree Limb

The other twenty-four hours, my attending was fatigued to the question of what to put on a tree after cut off the limb. My wife had remembered a fourth dimension when her grandfather spoke about painting a tree wound with varnish, but she idea she must be misremembering. After all, that couldn't exist right, could it? Is this something you should put on a tree wound, or are there other ways to bargain with information technology.

What Practice You lot Put On A Tree After Cutting Off A Limb? It was once standard practice to paint a tree wound afterward trimming. However, information technology is at present considered better to go out the tree to heal naturally, leaving the cutting unpainted and there are just a few instances when anything should be applied to the cut.

Unfortunately for the trees in the garden of my wife'due south grandfather, painting varnish, tar, or similar sticky substances onto the wound of a freshly made cutting WAS considered the right affair to do.

Fortunately, we now know that this is not a proficient idea, although in that location are a few exceptions. Hither'due south a rundown of what you demand to know virtually making good for you cuts, post cutting intendance, and the circumstances in which applying something to a tree cut is the best thing to do.

What Do You Put On A Tree After Cutting Off A Limb?

Professional arborists, landscape gardeners, and horticulturalists are divided over the answer to this question. Generally speaking, they fall into two groups:

Grouping Ane: This group believes that it is important to seal a tree wound later on pruning. They take been taught that it is an constructive way to prevent both potential decay caused by excess moisture and disease caused past the entrance of micro-organisms into the open wound.
Group Two: This group is of the opinion that trees are best left to their ain devices after pruning and that their natural healing abilities are sufficient to protect them from disease and decay.

Of form, this division between the experienced professionals is not especially useful for the enthusiastic but amateur gardener who is looking for informed communication to guide them. So let me guide you lot through what happens when you lot prune a tree, how trees recover from pruning and the ins, and outs of wound sealers. Later on this, you should be well equipped to make your ain, informed decision about what to put on a tree after cutting off a limb.

What Happens When You Prune A Tree?

Copse and other woody plants have a well developed, natural response to damage. Their reaction is the same whether a wound is caused through natural causes, such equally in the case of storm harm, or as the result of deliberate pruning.

The way in which a tree responds to damage is not the same equally healing in the way that well-nigh people understand it. For example, when a person suffers a wound, their natural healing systems kicking into gear and:

Your blood clots to preclude excessive claret loss
A crust forms over the wound to protect the body from illness-causing organisms.
Nether the crust healing takes place and the damaged tissue is replaced with new, healthy tissue which is integrated into the existing, surrounding tissue.

Nonetheless, when a tree recovers from a wound it:

Forms a special coating of tissue that both physically and chemically repels harmful organisms. This layer is made up of a circuitous substance called lignin. You can recollect of this a kind of mucilage that holds the cells of a tree together and makes the institute "woody ."
Beginning at the border of the wound and working towards the center, this tissue seals the wound off from the rest of the tree. This leaves the area of the wound encased in a kind of vanquish.
New growth gradually spreads over the acme of the wound shell merely does non integrate with it.

So, people create new tissue that integrates with the existing and forms a seamless repair, while trees encase a wound in a capsule which remains forever sealed off from the rest of the tree.

Understanding this distinction is critical when considering using sealants on your tree.

What IS A Wound Pruning Sealer?

Unsurprisingly, annihilation that is used to camouflage the area exposed after pruning a tree is a wound pruning sealer. They do not have to be a commercially available product. Many gardeners utilizer habitation-made sealers, or products designed for other uses but used for this purpose – for instance, paint or varnish.

Likewise called pruning sealers, pruning paint, or wound paint, the products found online and in stores are thick liquids made to be painted onto the area where you have cutting dorsum your tree.

They claim to promote the healing of pruning cuts and minimize sap loss.

The majority of sealers are petroleum based although some may also contain asphalt and a new generation of sealers has begun to emerge with ingredients that audio much similar cosmetics. Yes, y'all can now treat your trees wound with an application of sealer containing collagen or even aloe vera.

When Is A Wound Sealer Used?

Wound sealers are traditionally used immediately after you, or your professional gardener/arborist have removed a limb from one of your trees. The theory beingness that by sealing the wound apace you minimize the take chances of infection.

Though many gardeners used to utilise wound dressings such as latex paint mixed with water to protect copse after pruning, electric current research has revealed that this is not beneficial. Wound dressings don't forbid disuse, disease or insect infestations every bit once believed. They may even forestall the wood from drying, which can spark fungal growth. If you want to apply a wound dressing for cosmetic reasons, yous should at to the lowest degree make sure the paint is nontoxic.

How Can Pruning Sealers Exist A Bad Affair?

Wound sealers do non, as was once previously believed, prevent affliction, disuse, or insect infestations. In some cases, sealers might even be harmful. For instance, using a sealer on your tree can:

Seal in whatever moisture, insects, and disease already present, promoting infection and decay.
Prevent the wood from drying which can create the perfect conditions for fungal infections.
Attract exactly the kind of organisms you are trying to exclude, because some may be drawn by the ingredients of the sealer.
Terminate or wearisome the natural "encasing" process of the wood, causing the tree stress and creating a longer window of vulnerability.

Should You Use A Wound Pruning Sealer At All?

In the majority of cases, information technology is all-time to get out a tree to heal itself. On average this will take a twelvemonth or two, depending on the species, size of the cut, and whatsoever environmental factors which may have an affect.

Withal, sometimes:

Y'all Should Use A Wound Pruning Sealer

For example, you may be forced to prune a tree during the bound or summer. This is not the best time to do your pruning. Wintertime is the optimal flavor for pruning your copse because their growth is at a minimum, or completely dormant, and the chance of affliction is at its lowest. None the less, if the tree has sustained some damage or has branches that are crossing over and rubbing against each other, you may have no choice than to clip ASAP.

In this case, it may exist prudent to use a audio sealer if the tree is going to otherwise exist left especially vulnerable.

Another occasion is during periods of severe drought when a tree will have difficulty recovering because it is already having to conserve fluids. In this situation, a thin layer of sealer can help a tree seal in the piffling moisture information technology has.

Finally, if a limb has broken off, and the intermission is affluent with the torso, the tree will discover it significantly more difficult to seal itself. As a outcome, a picayune sealer might be appropriate.

What Should You Do Later Cutting Off A Tree Limb?

Before because what to exercise after cutting off a limb, you should ensure you are pruning correctly.

Yous should always prune with sharp, clean tools to preclude injury, ragged cuts, and disease. Accept care to clean your trimmers, saws, and pruning shears between uses, thoroughly drying them and storing them in a clean, dry out identify. This will minimize the possibility of introducing disease via dirty tools.

Place your cutting at the base of the limb leaving a small collar of wood at the base. This is the point at which the branch grows out from the torso and is a slightly swollen, raised area. Leaving this collar makes it easier for the tree to form information technology's callous.

If pruning sealer/pigment should not be your first line of response to help your pruned tree, what should you exercise?

Equally before long equally you lot have finished pruning requite your tree a long difficult potable of water. This will assistance it stay hydrated and eliminate ane stressor that tin bear upon wound recovery.
Fertilize your tree equally you usually would BUT avoid those with loftier levels of nitrogen, particularly if you take pruned a number of limbs. While it might normally be appropriate, nitrogen bolsters leafy growth and this surge in growth, alongside the need to heal, can exist too much for a tree, causing information technology to go weak, stressed, and vulnerable.

The Final Word

Generally speaking, y'all should leave a tree to recover natuurally after you have cutting off a limb. At that place are a few circumstances where a wound sealer might exist appropriate, but other than that you should focus on making the right pruning cuts and supporting your tree in its ain recovery procedure.