Content
- How to cut column oak with a sense of proportion
- Recommended time is in late winter
- How to perform the pruning shears correctly
- Avoid cutting into old wood
- Tips
Oak trees are best pruned in the fall
How to cut column oak with a sense of proportion
With a tight, upright, slim silhouette, the pillar oak reaches up to 20 m high. Its elegant stature preserves the Quercus robur without horticultural intervention, so that a pruning is not absolutely necessary. Nevertheless, to regulate their height and width, nothing speaks against a shape cut. What you should focus on here, we explain here.
Recommended time is in late winter
A pruning in the middle of the season means pure stress for your column oak. Choose an appointment in the middle of the safe. This has the advantage that the tree does not bear its foliage dress, as a result of which you have a clear view of the arrangement of the branches. This allows precise cutting, which benefits the harmonious look. In practice, a frost-free day has proven to be excellent between January and March, in good time before the recent sprouting.
How to perform the pruning shears correctly
A meticulous cut is rewarded on a column oak with a dense foliage dress and compact growth. Decisive contributes to where you start the scissors. A cut a few millimeters above a sleeping eye, acts as an impulse for a shoot. Therefore, look for small bumps under the bark to cut the branch at this point. Further, pay attention to these aspects:
As you go through the work, take a few steps backwards to plan the next cuts. The natural growth habit should be preserved as much as possible, even after a larger shape cut.
Avoid cutting into old wood
Regardless of their tolerance for cutting, a column oak is struggling to expel from old wood. Restrict the scope of the cutback to last year's growth, up to the last 2 years. If a limited space capacity is available from the outset, we recommend an annual shape cut of a maximum of one third.
Tips
The mother of all German column oaks can still be visited today. Visit the, Schöne von Harrenhausen 'in Hesse Babenhausen. Here, the magnificent tree has thrived in the Harrenhausen district for more than 570 years. Its seeds are traded among lovers as a rarity and trump with a high success rate of columnar descendants.