Crown thinning and canopy reduction are the two kinds of tree trimming that make a large tree less of a liability without taking it out. Thinning takes density out of the crown; canopy reduction takes size off the outside of it. They solve different problems, they are constantly confused, and neither one is topping.
We do both across Paris, mostly on mature maples, oaks and the multi-stemmed silver maples down on the river flats. Ring (226) 546-3814.
Crown thinning means selectively removing a proportion of the smaller branches through the crown, spread evenly, so what is left is the same shape and the same size but less dense.
The point is that wind passes through rather than pushing against. A dense crown behaves like a sail; a thinned one lets the gusts spill. On the shallow-rooted trees that the sandy Oak Plains ground under Paris produces, that matters more than it would elsewhere, because the failure mode here is the root plate lifting rather than the trunk breaking.
The limit for crown thinning and canopy reduction is about a quarter of the live crown in any one visit, and less on an older tree. Take more and you have shocked it into throwing out replacement growth, denser than what you removed. That is the mistake we get called to correct most often on trees along the Grand River valley, where the wind exposure tempts people into taking too much at once.
Crown thinning and canopy reduction are not the same cut. Canopy reduction shortens the limbs, and every cut has to land on a lateral branch large enough to take over as the new end of that limb. Roughly a third the diameter of what came off is the working rule.
That is what separates reduction from topping. Reduction leaves a smaller tree with a natural outline and a live growing point at the end of every cut limb. Topping leaves stubs, and the tree answers with weak regrowth off the wound faces.
A reduction is usually specified as a distance rather than a percentage — "reduce the two lowest limbs by about two metres" — because that is checkable afterwards, and a percentage is not.
If the problem is that the garden underneath gets no light, or the lawn will not grow, that is thinning.
If the problem is that a limb is over the roof, over the drive, or close to a wire, that is reduction on that limb — often just one or two of them, not the whole tree. On the narrow lots through central Paris that is most of the reduction work we do.
If the problem is that a big multi-stemmed silver maple has a union you do not trust, thinning and reduction both help by taking leverage off it, but the real answer may be cabling and bracing or, eventually, removal.
If the problem is that the tree is too big for the garden and always will be, no amount of crown reduction fixes that permanently. It buys years, and it has to be repeated. Sometimes the honest answer is replacing it with something the right size.
Crown thinning and canopy reduction do not make a tree safe. They reduce load, which reduces risk. A tree with a decayed base is not improved by taking weight off the top of it in any way that matters.
They also do not fix a tree that has already been topped. A topped tree's regrowth is attached to the surface of old wounds rather than anchored in sound wood, and no amount of subsequent trimming changes that. What it needs is a long programme of gradual reduction on the regrowth, forever, or removal.
Most people ring about one limb and end up with a scope covering three. Somebody comes out, looks at the whole crown, and puts a written figure and a written specification against it. Ring (226) 546-3814 or start from the home page.
Very few jobs stop at one of these. Here is everything else we do.
Tree trimming and pruning is most of what we do in Paris, and most tree trimming is not about making a tree smaller. It is about taking weight off the wrong places, getting the dead material out, and cutting so the tree can seal what we cut.
View Tree Trimming and Pruning
Dead branch removal is the tree trimming job people put off longest, and the one that gives least warning. A dead limb does not creak, lean or drop leaves to tell you it is going. It stays exactly where it is until the day it does not, which is why dead branch removal gets booked after the fact rather than before.
View Dead Branch Removal
Emergency storm damage cleanup is the call that comes at five in the morning, and it is the one part of tree trimming nobody plans for. A tree across the drive, a limb through the garage roof, a trunk resting on the car, or a branch left hanging over the front door with nothing holding it. Storm damage cleanup is answered outside working hours.
View Emergency Storm Damage Cleanup
Tree removal is the last option on the list, not the first, and we would rather talk you out of a tree removal than sell you one you did not need. But a dead, split, badly leaning or structurally finished tree beside a house is past what tree trimming can fix, and pretending otherwise costs more in the end.
View Tree Removal
Tree cabling and bracing is how you keep a structurally suspect tree that is otherwise healthy and worth keeping, once tree trimming alone will not do it. A cable is a flexible support fitted high in the crown between two limbs or two stems; a brace is a rigid rod through a union that is already moving. Cabling and bracing limits movement, it does not repair the union.
View Tree Cabling and Bracing
Stump grinding and removal is the tree trimming job that turns a felled tree back into usable garden. A grinder takes the stump down below ground level in chips, so the area can be levelled, turfed, planted or paved. Stump grinding is quoted separately from taking the tree down.
View Stump Grinding and RemovalDescribe the tree and what is under it. Somebody attends, looks at the whole property, and returns a written scope with the debris and the exclusions spelled out.
The more you can tell us about the tree and the access, the more the first visit achieves. Only a way of reaching you is required. Would you sooner speak to someone? The number is (226) 546-3814.
