Pruning Japanese Maples

Pruning Japanese Maples

Like graceful little girls, our Japanese maples dance with the wind in our gardens. Their feeling of movement and beauty of form comes naturally to these special trees, and no pruning is needed except for grooming, as long as they can be allowed to reach their full size. Sometimes, however, we need to limit the size of a maple that is outgrowing its place or find a favorite maple obstructing our views or pathways, and want to do some pruning. I hope I can give you some information about how maples respond to pruning so that you will not lose the natural grace of your trees when pruning becomes necessary. The grace and movement of our maples is one of their most charming traits, so our goal should be to prune so that our maples look “natural” or un-pruned. This becomes most difficult when we wish to reduce the size of a maple.

The first step in any pruning session is to clean and sterilize all tools. Dipping tools in a solution of 10 parts water, 1 part Clorox, or dipping in Phyton 27, mixed according to directions, can do this. This prevents the spread of infection from one tree to another, just as washing your hands helps prevent the spread of colds.