Tree Lopping in Axedale Without the Butchery

Lopping, or topping, means cutting limbs back to stubs at whatever height looks about right from the ground. A reduction means cutting each limb back to a side branch big enough to take over as the new end, so the tree keeps its shape, the wound closes and the growth that follows is sound. The difference matters more on the trees we have here than almost anywhere else, because red gums and box respond to stub cuts with a thicket of weakly attached shoots that is taller, denser and more dangerous inside five years than the tree ever was. Decay gets in through the stubs at the same time. That is why TB'S Trees will quote a reduction for an Axedale tree and will not quote a topping job.

Axedale trees, the problem, and how we fix it

• A red gum over the house shedding limbs every summer. Red gums drop long horizontal limbs in hot, still weather. We reduce the end weight on the limbs that reach over the roof, strip out the deadwood and leave the rest of the crown alone. The tree stays, the roof stops copping branches.
• A cypress or pine windbreak on the highway side that has grown too tall. Old shelterbelts along the McIvor Highway paddocks lean into the prevailing wind and outgrow their job. We bring the height down in stages over a couple of seasons if the trees are worth keeping, or advise tree removal in Axedale when they are too far gone to reduce sensibly.
• Box trees growing into the single-wire line across the paddock. Grey box and yellow box near private powerlines get clearance pruning with the right approach distances, not a chainsaw haircut. Where the line belongs to the distributor rather than you, we tell you who to call.
• A tree someone topped years ago that is now a mess of shoots. We thin the shoots back to a few well-placed leaders and reshape over two or three visits, which is slower than another topping but the only way to end up with a safe tree.
• A pepper tree or old exotic shading the solar panels or veggie patch. Selective reduction on the shading side only, so the tree still looks like a tree from the road.
• A willow on the river frontage that has split and sprawled. Willows are a weed on the Campaspe. We can reduce a sentimental one, but we will also talk honestly about replacing it with a red gum or a local wattle.

What a typical crown reduction in Axedale looks like

The most common job we do here is on a lifestyle block between the township and Junortoun. A big red gum sits inside twenty metres of the house, the canopy hangs over the carport and the owner has been told by a mate to "take the top out of it". We climb the tree, or set up the platform if the ground allows, and work through the crown limb by limb. Each limb over the carport is cut back to a lateral at least a third of the size of the piece removed, so the tree can seal the wound and push growth from an existing branch rather than from bare stub. Deadwood comes out as we go. The upper crown, which is nowhere near the house, is thinned lightly or left alone.

By the end the tree is a couple of metres lower over the building, noticeably lighter on the house side and still recognisably the same tree. Branches are chipped on site, larger wood is cut for firewood if you want it, and the lawn is raked before we leave. Most reductions of this size are a single day. Reductions on trees near the highway or near powerlines take longer because of traffic control and approach distances.

Timing tree lopping around Axedale

The district has a couple of seasonal quirks. Eucalypts can be reduced through most of the year, but we avoid heavy work on red gums during the run of forty-degree days in January and February, when the tree is already stressed and the cut faces bake. The best window for reductions on native trees is autumn through to early spring. Deciduous windbreaks and ornamentals are easier to read and reduce once the leaves are off in winter, though frost sits hard on the river flats and we do not cut into frost-tender exotics on the coldest mornings.

Because much of Axedale sits under a Bushfire Management Overlay, a lot of owners want crowns pulled back from the house before the fire danger period starts. Spring is the sensible time to book that work so the crew is not fighting summer heat and total fire ban days. After a wild storm, and this district gets its share, we run an emergency line for split limbs and hangers.

If your tree needs structure work rather than size work, deadwooding and crown thinning are covered on our tree pruning page for Axedale. We also do the same style of reduction for tree lopping in Heathcote, tree lopping in Junortoun and reductions in Strathfieldsaye. The Axedale suburb page covers the rest of what we do around the township, and the main tree lopping page for Bendigo goes deeper into why we work to AS 4373.

Questions Axedale locals ask about lopping