Storms have wreaked havoc on Edmonton’s tree canopy. Gerald Matheson from Arbor Vista Landscaping offers his expertise in cleaning up the mess. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. Kent Morrison: When do you know it’s time to take your tree down? Gerald Matheson: If it’s leaning really heavily. There’s signs; you want to keep an eye on the health of your tree: the vigor, maybe annual pruning – every two to five years, for sure. You want to maintain what you have. KM: When you see major damage, like trees broken and lying on the ground, what should you do? Clear as much as possible? GM: Correct. For bigger branches, you definitely want to clean that wound up and dress it so it’ll heal properly. KM: What does dressing the wound mean? GM: I use a balsam bark tree pruning spray. You want to clean up the rough edges so the tree can heal quickly. KM: What about trees that are leaning? GM: Because of the ground saturation, it is leaning with the wind. So you could definitely put a couple of tree stakes on that, pull it straight, give it a couple years, and it’ll get rerooted and be a nice tree. KM: What should you do if you see water pooling around a tree? GM: If it’s a mature tree, they’re loving this moisture because of the amount of growth they’ve put on. I’ve seen shoot elongation that’s been 18 inches long. So you want to tip that back because you don’t want long, skinny, weak branches. By tipping it back, then it’ll develop a stronger branch. KM: What about when a tree takes down infrastructure like power lines? GM: That one’s pretty much a 100-per cent of removal. The city would have to come in and drop the power lines so that they could do a proper cleanup. (Call) the city community services, especially if it’s boulevard trees. KM: What’s your advice for trees still standing but haven’t been pruned recently and hang over streets or buildings? GM: You want to identify the tree species because of Dutch elm disease; there’s certain bylaws and different species have different growth habits. Some are more upright; some are more oval. (Pruning) follows a 30-per cent rule: You don’t want to take more than a third. So if the tree’s never been pruned, you want to stop at 30-per cent for the first pruning. KM: If you have to take a tree out, can you plant something new there? GM: Definitely do that. You can have a stump grinder professional come in. You do want to check for underground utilities, make sure there’s nothing there that you know is going to impede replanting a tree.
