Tree Pruning Around Axedale and the Campaspe

Most tree pruning in Axedale is about two things: keeping the old native trees safe and keeping the newer plantings on lifestyle blocks growing into something useful. The pages below answer the questions we get asked most often at the gate, and finish with what a typical day of pruning looks like out here.

Which Axedale trees actually need pruning?

Fewer than people think, and different ones than people think. The mature river red gums along the Campaspe and the streamside reserve rarely need shaping, but they do need deadwood taken out where they overhang a house, a shed, a driveway or the rail trail fence. The grey box and yellow box on the higher ground are structurally sound trees that mostly need clearance from buildings and lines rather than crown work. What genuinely benefits from regular pruning is the planted stuff: the pin oaks and claret ashes in township gardens, the pepper trees and old fruit trees on the original farmhouse blocks, and the rows of young natives and cypress that new owners put in as shelterbelts and then leave alone for a decade.

What does deadwooding a red gum involve?

A red gum sheds branches as a normal part of growing old, and it holds onto dead limbs for years before they let go, often on a hot, windless afternoon. Deadwooding means a climber goes through the crown and removes the dead and dying limbs above a certain size, cutting back to the branch collar so the tree can seal the wound. It does not mean taking live limbs off or reducing the tree. Big red gums on the river flats are physically demanding to climb, which is why our crew keeps up its climbing and aerial rescue training rather than treating a hundred-year-old gum as just another tree. Where the tree sits over the river reserve or a public track we also confirm who owns it before touching it.

When should formative pruning start on a new shelterbelt?

Early, and lightly. Lifestyle blocks around Axedale are planted with everything from ironbark and yellow gum tubestock to leyland cypress and pittosporum screens. In the first three to five years a young tree wants one clear leader, well-spaced branches and no co-dominant stems that will split later. Ten minutes with secateurs on each tree at that age saves a rigging job at year twenty. We are happy to walk a whole planting once a year and correct as we go, which is cheap work compared with what the same trees cost to fix once they are big.

Who prunes trees near powerlines out here?

It depends on whose line it is. Many Axedale properties are fed by a private line from the pole at the road to the house, and any tree growing into that span is the owner's responsibility. TB'S Trees carries out that clearance work with the required approach distances and, where needed, a shutdown arranged through the distributor. The lines along the road and the single-wire spans across paddocks belong to the network, and the distributor manages clearance on those.

Can pruning reduce bushfire risk on a Bushfire Management Overlay block?

It can help, and for a lot of the district it is the sensible first step. Lifting canopies away from the house, removing dead material and breaking up the continuous fuel between shrubs and tree crowns all lower the chance of fire reaching the roof. Pruning under the overlay is treated differently from removal, and there are exemptions for managing vegetation close to a dwelling. TB'S Trees confirms the planning controls on your block with the City of Greater Bendigo before the work is booked so nothing is done that needs a permit you do not have.

What time of year suits pruning in Axedale?

Native trees can be pruned through most of the year, though we keep away from heavy deadwooding on red gums in the worst of the summer heat when the crew and the tree are both under stress. Deciduous ornamentals are pruned in winter once the structure is visible. Stone fruit on the old farmhouse blocks is the exception: apricots, plums and cherries are cut in late summer after harvest rather than winter, because open cuts in a cold, wet Campaspe winter let disease in. Frost sits on the river flats far longer than it does up on the rises.

A typical tree pruning day in Axedale

A property on the eastern side of the township, a couple of hectares running down to the river with the house near the road. In the morning the climber deadwoods two big red gums that hang over the machinery shed and the driveway, lowering the larger dead limbs on a rope so nothing lands on the roof. Around midday the crew clears the private power span from the road, taking a yellow box back off the line with the proper distances kept. The afternoon goes on the row of three-year-old cypress and ironbark along the boundary, correcting leaders and removing low branches, and on the two apricot trees behind the house. Everything is chipped on site and the chip is tipped where the owner wants it. If a tree turns out to be past pruning we say so and quote tree removal in Axedale separately rather than pruning something that should come down.

Size reduction on trees that have simply grown too big is a different job again, covered on our tree lopping page for Axedale. We prune the same way for tree pruning in Junortoun and tree pruning in Heathcote at either end of the rail trail. The Axedale suburb page lists everything we do around home, and the main tree pruning service page for Bendigo explains the standard we work to.

Pruning questions from around the township