On Tue, 16 Sep 2003 11:55:36 GMT, Frogleg wrote:



Crape Murder is a term often given to "pollarding" -- the practice of
severely trimming back major branches of crape myrtles to a pretty
much bald state so as to encourage new shoots and prolific bloom.
grow and bloom at will.
The practice I most often see applied to crapes is called "topping."
Pollarding is a distinct and different practice that involves
carefully training the plant to have pollard heads. Each year, the
two-year growth is removed but the one-year growth is not. There are
always some branches there to produce NRG, but the healing wounds
eventually create large, distinctive "knobs" at the pruning sites. I
believe it developed in Europe centuries ago as a way to produce
firewood (generally applied to larger trees for that purpose).

Topping, OTOH, annually removes all the branches down to a
hat-rack-like skeleton. In the process, all the NRG-producing leaves
are removed and the plant must rely on stored reserves to recover.
Gradually these reserves are depleted and the plant dies prematurely.
In the case of large trees, it often occurs when someone erroneously
assumes their tree is "too tall" and might fall over. In fact, trees
are designed to be tall and will not break just because they get to a
certain height (though, of course, there are examples of trees
--pecans especially spring to mind--that tend to oversprawl and break,
but the solution is to lightly thin the tips, not top the branches
back to a large stub). Once topped, the prophecy is fulfilled: the
regrowth is poorly attached and, if left to get large enough, will be
very likely to break off in a strong wind or similar extreme
conditions.

Otherwise, I agree with Frogleg. Don't prune unless the branches are
hitting your roof or poking you in the eye and it will become a very
nice, intricately shaped tree. Incidentally, snipping the spent
flower stalks is common and relatively harmless, but I find it to be
unnecessary, as well.

Keith
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