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anyone here ever coppiced a starndard tree successfully?

anybody done it? a friend's amelanchier is a badly shaped standard and it won't look good for too long. how about coppicing it?  trunk is approx 6cm diameter- not the end of the world if it 'doesn't pull through' but would love to hear from somebody who has some experience of same?

 

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  • ObelixxObelixx Posts: 30,065

    I had a beautiful parrotia persica (Persian Ironwood) which was 12 years old and whose crown I had lifted so I could see the form and bark of its stems.  It was cut down last summer by a lightening strike so I had to cut it right at the base.    It has resprouted and will make a good multi stemmed shrub.

    I should have thought an amelanchier would do the same but be sure to cut it when there are no frosts forecast so the wound can heal well and before the sap starts rising in late Jan/early Feb.  

    Vendée - 20kms from Atlantic coast.
    "The price good men (and women) pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men (and women)."
    Plato
  • FairygirlFairygirl Posts: 55,117

    I'd think it could work. Amelanchier are usually described as shrubs rather than trees anyway. I had one which was more 'tree like' in a previous garden, near a hornbeam hedge. I notice the new owners have assumed it's part of the hedge and have hacked it down when doing the hedge - I'll go and take a look and see what it's like!

    It's a place where beautiful isn't enough of a word....



    I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...
  • ooh thanks - sorry to hear about the Parrotia - what a gorgeous tree that is. nothing like it for autumn colour and now you have even more foliage that it's a multistem.  you've given me confidence. so mid winter would be a good time - perhaps when it's lost the last of the foliage ... am presuming the cut would be just a couple of inches above soil level?bit slanty to avoid rot ...

    thanks Fairygirl, intrigued to know if your old amelanchier survived the new owners' chop ... !

  • Do you mean coppice (cut to the ground) or pollard (cut to the top of the stem)?

  • coppice . down to the ground

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