When and how much can u cut back a yew

[Jason_mazzy]

I'm interested in cutting back a yew severely and reshaping 90% of the foliage. I'm familiar with pines but not yews. Unlike pines What I've seen it looks like you can cut into old growth and still get new growth and new needles. Is this right?

 

[october]

Can you post the tree and let us know what you are thinking about doing? Also, yes, yew back bud from every where. Also, they grow pretty fast so you can actually get branches as thick as a pencil in about 2 1/2 years.

Rob

 

[Jason_mazzy]

LOL My plan would be to remove 90% of the foilage because it is so rediculously covered. It is an emerald spreader and I see good lines but It needs to be near defoliated IMO.

 

[Dav4]

You can be pretty ruthless pruning the canopy of a healthy yew, and removing 90% of the canopy, though extreme, would likely not be too much to overcome. Still, if the stock is nice, I'd proceed with a bit more caution. Make sure that you leave a bit of foliage on any branch you plan on keeping. Looking forward to the pics.

 

[mcpesq817]

You can be pretty ruthless pruning the canopy of a healthy yew, and removing 90% of the canopy, though extreme, would likely not be too much to overcome. Still, if the stock is nice, I'd proceed with a bit more caution. Make sure that you leave a bit of foliage on any branch you plan on keeping. Looking forward to the pics.

I agree 100% with this. Yews are very hardy and can take a ton of abuse, almost like a deciduous tree in my experience. That being said, if recently collected, I'd go easy on it for a year or two until you're sure that it has recovered.

On yews that I've collected, I work on a two-year cycle. In the first year, I hose off the root ball to get as much of the field soil out and keep as many roots as possible to fit it in a reasonably sized container. I probably take close to 70% of the foliage off too, and then let it sit for a year, fertilizing it heavily and leaving it in full sun. In year 2, I repot again. The yews I've worked with put on an incredible amount of fine feeder root growth in a year in 100% inorganic mix, so I end up cutting a lot of the older roots (most of which the tree seems to give up on and let die), put it in a smaller pot, and then start the basic styling. After that, the yews bud like crazy everywhere and they become really easy to work with.

 

[amkhalid]

I don't fully understand yew. I've seen pics from Europe where they cut newly collected stuff back to nothing and the bud everywhere. I've also seen that with foundation plantings around here.

However, I've never been able to get my yews to bud back on really old wood (i.e. main branches) despite some hard prunings. Keep in mind, these are in bonsai pots and I've never cut them back beyond the green. Maybe you just have to push them to the brink. Or maybe I time it wrong.