Pruning a maple

[Bonsainoob88]

I know people may get different results and what works better for one may not work for others etc etc . But all I want to do is make sure I don't end up with a dead tree.

I want to give a few maples a good cutback and repot one of them , it is getting close to spring and the buds have formed on one of them .

Do I need to cutback before the buds break then repot as they're just breaking . Or was I better off doing the cutbacks before the buds are formed .

Cheers for any advice

 

[leatherback]

first off, you will not kill a maple by regular pruning. You might get a bit of saploss, but probably nothing that raises concern.

That being said, larger cuts of main limbs can kead to dying back of part of the trunk. Any cut larger than say 2cm is preferably postponed to after the first slush has extended in my garden.

 

[GGB]

I have an article saved somewhere called "maples with no tears" the author says if you hard prune the roots (during repot) BEFORE you hard prune the top (that same day of course) the saploss is minimal. I don't know if it's true but I have been doing it for two years and it seems to be fine. Granted, as Leatherback said, if I was really going to be removing a lot of wood I would wait until late spring-ish so the tree could actively recover. Only my opinion. From what I can remember Merigioli also advocates heavy pruning during repot, but he's in Italy and that's a special climate.

 

[Bonsainoob88]

Soo are we saying I can do a hard cutback any time of the year here ?

 

[Bonsainoob88]

Any links to previous threads of when and how to prune a maple so I don't need to start a new one

 

[Shibui]

I have an article saved somewhere called "maples with no tears" the author says if you hard prune the roots (during repot) BEFORE you hard prune the top (that same day of course) the saploss is minimal. I don't know if it's true but I have been doing it for two years and it seems to be fine. Granted, as Leatherback said, if I was really going to be removing a lot of wood I would wait until late spring-ish so the tree could actively recover. Only my opinion. From what I can remember Merigioli also advocates heavy pruning during repot, but he's in Italy and that's a special climate.

I've also found that root prune will definitely stop sap leaking from pruning cuts.
Generally there's no problem pruning maples and repotting in a single operation.
Spring before buds open is a great time to do root pruning.
Top pruning can be done any time through summer but is a bit harder to see what you are doing because of leaves. Just after leaf drop is another great time to prune maples. Definitely much less bleeding at that time down here.

Japanese maples can sometimes be temperamental. Older trees sometimes die back after hard prune or hard root prune. For better advice on your trees some pics would help us understand the size and age of the trees and where you intend to chop.

 

[dbonsaiw]

I want to give a few maples a good cutback and repot one of them , it is getting close to spring and the buds have formed on one of them .

Do I need to cutback before the buds break then repot as they're just breaking . Or was I better off doing the cutbacks before the buds are formed .

Best time to do work on the JMs is probably end of winter/early spring as buds starts to open. Just to make sure the lingo is correct, buds form in the previous season and hang out all winter until it's spring and they open. As the tree wakes up, the buds will start to swell. That's your que to get going with the repot and/or cut back. I personally do not repot my maples in summer, so if I miss the time I wait till next year. You can, however, prune back the maple later in the season after it leaves out and had a chance to replenish reserves.

You can prune and repot JMs at the same time and cutting back the roots will decrease the sap flow. Expect lots of bleeding otherwise (and that's ok).

I have found JMs to be moody and unpredictable when it comes to blind trunk chops leaving no branches. I will be cutting back only to existing branches on JMs this season (some of the cuts will be quite large).