The Garden Professors™

Auntie Mame was on to something when she told her orphaned nephew Patrick to “Haul out the Holly, Put up the Tree Before My Spirit Falls Again” (I just sang this in a concert with my community chorus.  I’ve been hauling out the holly since August, so I’m done.) 

Plants play a big part in our holiday traditions this time of year.  When it comes to decorating for the holidays, needless to say I prefer a simpler, natural approach. The best inspiration — and materials — come from nature and sometimes from your very own landscape. It is no secret that the celebration of Christmas was timed by early church leaders to coincide with other ancient winter festivals that predate Christianity.  It made it easy to get everyone to join in the celebrations. 

Saturnalia was a Roman festival that celebrated Saturn, the deity of agriculture, and the harvest. Yule was a 12-day midwinter festival celebrated by Germanic pagans into which Pope Julius I inserted Christmas in AD 336 (there was no celebration of Christmas until then), giving rise to the 12-day Christmastide festival (or Yuletide, depending on where you are). The celebration of the winter solstice is also of pagan origin, a celebration of the darkest, or shortest, day of the year (in the Northern Hemisphere) and the rebirth of the sun.

Many of these festivals included the bringing of evergreens and natural elements indoors to celebrate the connection between humans and nature. They were a sign that life would return after the cold, harsh winter. And also a way to bring a little cheer indoors to brighten up the home during the cold, dreary winter. 

If you look at many of the more traditional elements of Christmas, you’ll notice their connection with nature, and specifically plants — evergreens, holly, amaryllis, poinsettias and more. Of course, the star of the show is the Christmas tree. Christmas trees as we know them didn’t debut until the 16th century in Germany.

A prickly holiday tradition

I’ve written about several holiday plant traditions over the years, each a different way to look at a plant that or plants that bring tradition and cheer into the home.  Perhaps the most popular of these articles is about one of the most recent additions to the holiday plant family – cacti.  The interest in this holiday plant is surging thanks to the interest in houseplants at the moment.  This is making an issue I pointed out several years ago in the article A Cactus by Any Other Name: A Case of Mistaken Holiday Cactus Identity about the mis-naming of cacti even more important.  There’s a Christmas cactus, but there’s also a Thanksgiving cactus (and an Easter one, too). 

Thanks to years of marketing and selling Thanksgiving cacti as Christmas cacti (since they bloom early enough for the Christmas shopping season and actual Christmas cactus bloom closer to Christmas), many people confuse the two.  This isn’t a big issue for the casual holiday plant shopper, but for those that “collect” the plants it can be an issue trying to sort out which is which.  For example, someone recently posted in a local plant group that they were looking for a Christmas cactus.  Half the responses were telling them where they could buy a Thanksgiving (more commonly called Zygo cactus after the zygomorphous shape of the flower) cactus and the other half were asking if they meant that they wanted a true Christmas cactus or a Thanksgiving cactus. 

As romantic as poop on a stick

As holiday plant traditions go, the hanging of mistletoe has to be both the most interesting and weirdest.  As tradition goes, if two people meet beneath the mistletoe they’re supposed to kiss.  How did kissing become associated with a toxic plant that parasitizes trees and whose name translated from the Anglo-Saxon means “poop on a stick” from the fact that the seeds are spread by bird droppings? 

As I shared in The Myth, the Legend, the Parasite: Romance, Lore, and Science beneath the Mistletoe, Norse legend has it that the goddess Frigga (Frig, or Fricka) made everything on earth promise to not hurt her beloved son Baldr, but she forgot to ask mistletoe since it was so small and innocent looking.  Baldur’s brother, the trickster Loki (you know, the one in all the movies these days) made a spear of mistletoe and that ended up killing Baldr. The white berries of mistletoe represent Frigga’s tears, and she decreed that the plant should represent love and that no harm should befall anyone standing below it.  And there you have it.

The flower that’s really just a bunch of overachieving leaves

Most recently, I shared a bit of history and lore around poinsettias, that common but prissy holiday plant that most people can’t keep alive more than a few weeks.  I mean, the original Aztec name for the plant, cuetlaxochitl (ket-la-sho-she), can be translated as meaning “flower that withers” or “mortal flower that perishes like all that is pure”, so the reputation fits. The actual flowers of the plant are the ugly little greenish-yellow bits in the center, which are highlighted by leaves, called bracts, that change colors to bright red (and more colors now) as the flowers develop.

The flower and the bright red represented a gift from the gods for the sacrifices that the Aztecs would make to them. You can read a bit about the history, and how to save them and get them to rebloom from year to year (if you dare) in my festive little ditty Poinsettias: from ditch weed to holiday super star (history, lore, and how to get those d@!% things to rebloom next year).  Of course, there’s been recent discussion on how the story of the poinsettia is similar to the pagan traditions associated with Christmas – a plant tradition of the Aztecs was changed as a way to fit with the Christmas story and work as a conversion tool. It is good to know a bit about the original tradition of the plant to understand its importance throughout history. 

Haul out the holly….and the magnolia….and the rhododendron…..

Holiday plant traditions don’t stop at those finicky plants we grow in greenhouses- the original traditions of Solstice and Yule consisted of bringing in all different types of plants for the season. Sometimes you have to look no farther than your yard to find natural elements fit for a holiday celebration. If you have evergreen trees or shrubs in your landscape, they can easily be incorporated into holiday arrangements indoors or out.

While you can readily purchase live Christmas greenery at many retailers and markets (except for this year, with all the supply issues going on), what you can harvest from your own yard or nearby woods (where permissible) will be much fresher and last much longer. Remember that harvesting branches from your own trees and shrubs is actually pruning them, so you can kill two birds with one stone.

Both white and Virginia pine make excellent decorating choices as they are long-lived and retain their needles well. Junipers, cedars and firs all have interesting foliage and wonderful evergreen scents. Junipers can sometimes be found with berries and cedars sometimes have tiny cones. Spruce is a great choice for wreaths, as it is bristly and holds its shape.

Decorating doesn’t have to be left to the needled evergreens, though. Holly is a classic choice, but mountain laurel, rhododendron, boxwood and magnolia and many others can provide beauty and elegance in holiday displays.

You don’t even need to stick with green things in your decorating, either. Attractive bare branches, plumes from ornamental grasses and other “brown” things can add contrast. Other natural items, such as fruits, nuts and pinecones can also be incorporated for color and interest.  Just take a look around your yard or neighborhood to find those natural elements to bring indoors.

To keep your greenery fresh, there are some basic tips that you can follow:

• Use sharp pruners to make cuts, and keep the ends of branches in water until ready for use.
• Soak evergreens in water overnight to absorb moisture and extend shelf life.
• Keep arrangements in a cool location until use.
• Keep evergreens out of sunlight to reduce moisture loss.
• Use an anti-transpirant spray to keep in moisture.
• Don’t decorate too early — live plants have a limited lifespan.
• If purchasing plant materials, select healthy, green plants and flexible needles/leaves.

Very large and old trees don’t often attain size and splendor free of defect and disease. A mature tree may have accumulated some damage, injury or disease along its path to grandeur. It can contain hazardous branch attachments that have not failed yet, large sections of dead wood or it may bear the burden of an assemblage of cables and other devices installed over the years to sustain it. Very old mature trees have endured perhaps multiple human lifetimes of exposure to storms, droughts, pests and, perhaps worst, early pruning practices. Trees gain age and majesty when they don’t fall down or fail multiple large branches. To do this trees defend their wood biochemically from invading fungi. Trees also cover over decayed wood with new wood that is fairly impervious to the old infection. High vigor trees with adequate resources (water, soil, sunlight) should be able to contain decay that would shorten their lives otherwise.

Dr. Alex Shigo (2003) devised a chart showing the amount of pruning over a tree’s life time. Young trees have all living cells and most of the wood is sapwood, therefore the trimmings in young trees are of living tissues. As trees grow older and shade themselves heartwood develops in the canopy. It’s not living, doesn’t conduct water and minerals but does provide support to branches and strength to the canopy. Heartwood is also more resistant to decay than sapwood. The pruning of a mature tree removes a combination of living and dead cells. An over mature or ancient tree has much more dead cell tissue and only deadwood should be removed with an attempt made to preserve all stems with leaves.

Large trees have large branches and the temptation is to remove large branches to achieve pruning objectives. This would get more done and we would then have to prune less, right? But this is a flawed strategy and the results are the opposite of what the tree owners are trying to achieve. As trees get large, pruning cuts should be smaller and occur frequently. Guidance can be given to branch growth by many small cuts rather than large ones. This approach directs growth without causing rampant regrowth of dormant or latent buds. Latent buds have a purpose, they rescue trees from death should there be a catastrophe. They are preformed along large branches and will sprout when exposed to sunlight or when the terminal buds are removed. Large topping or heading cuts typically activate latent buds and the tree subsequently grows back too many branches in one place. These require selection and careful removal over time and can involve quite a bit of repair pruning to fix the tangle cause by massive heading cuts. Aging trees develop an extensive heartwood that is easily exposed to decay from large pruning wounds so large cuts should be avoided.

Larger trees develop more sapwood which needs energy for respiration relative to the amount of leaves in the canopy. The first duty of the leaves is to provide energy to keep all the cells in the young phloem and sapwood metabolically active. A typical tree only utilizes a few growth rings of sapwood for water transport and energy storage. As these rings age they narrow and there is less tissue from which to store and retrieve energy. Despite the subtle balance between canopy and energy utilization trees continue to grow throughout their lives at more or less the same rate. As trees age the amount of non-functional wood increases, this may be heartwood or deadwood in the canopy. At the end of their lives trees have nearly no living sapwood and the energy of the tree is mostly depleted. Over pruning causes further energy depletion. Removing leaves and buds that give rise to leaves from old trees reduces the amount of energy stored. This forces the tree to utilize sapwood reserves to recover from the pruning losses of the photosynthetic part of the tree. Severe pruning in old trees ultimately depletes them of stored sugars and leaves them without energy to make defensive compounds. This can exacerbate conditions by allowing disease or decay organisms to enter the sapwood.

What if your large tree was never structurally pruned and has branch faults or you have concerns for failure? You should always consult a certified arborist with training in Tree Risk Assessment. The health of the tree is important but the safety of those living around it is more important. Sometimes targeted pruning can be used to shift the balance of growth in a tree and strengthen branch attachments. This can take years of careful pruning with small or modest cuts. When large branches must be removed they should be left as long as feasible and the cut should be circular not an oval shape to decrease exposed surface area. Large pruning wounds should be limited to the fewest number required to achieve the pruning goal. Pruning paints and wound dressings are not recommended.

Large trees accumulate deadwood during natural senescence of inner branches or due to injury, disease or insect attack. Common practice has suggested removing deadwood from old trees but as arborists become more sensitive to urban ecology issues we realize that deadwood is prime habitat for cavity nesting birds and other life. Deadwood serves a purpose and, if it does not pose a threat to those living under or around the tree, it should be retained especially if evidence of utilization is present.

Caring for large trees is tedious because there is a lot at stake. Old trees are valuable and provide many benefits to their owners. Always seek expert opinions and be willing to pay for them, preferably from the arborist who does not do the pruning. Then act on those opinions with care and consideration and always closely supervise any pruning being done to your trees.
Use the following pointers from Gillman for mature tree pruning strategies:
-Evaluate your tree for health, strong branch structure and evidence of decay
-Remove dead branches as needed but retain some for wildlife if needed
-Perform structural pruning when feasible
-Shorten or remove branches with cracks swellings or deformities
-Remove parasites such as mistletoe or canker infested branches
-Retain as much live tissue as possible while achieving pruning objectives
-Keep cuts small (2inches) or moderate (4″) if the tree is a good decay compartmentalizer

References:
Gillman, E.F. 2012. An Illustrated Guide to Pruning 3rd ed.
Delman Cengage Learning, Clifton Park, NY.
Manion, P.D. 1991. Tree Disease Concepts. 2nd ed. Prentice-Hall, Englewoood Cliffs, N.J.
Shigo, A.L. 2003. Modern Arboriculture A systems approach to the care of trees and their associates. Shigo and Trees Associates Durham, NH. 3rd ed.

Welcome to the first People and Plants GP blog post. These posts, which will be on a random basis, will take a behind the scenes look at the namesake people behind many plant names. This first one will be about Andrew Jackson Downing.

Andrew Jackson Downing was born October 30/31, 1815 in Newburgh, New York to Samuel Downing and Eunice (née Bridge) Downing. His father was originally a wheelwright but later became a nurseryman. After he finished his schooling Andrew worked in his father’s nursery and was soon bitten by “the plant bug”. I’m sure many of us can identify with that “affliction”.
Over time he became more interested in landscape gardening, architecture and the relationship between them. He began writing articles about botany and landscaping but soon realized he needed to know more about both topics and so began a course of self-education. By the 1830’s he was producing pieces for newspapers and hort journals and in 1841 his first book, *A Treatise on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening, Adapted to North America, met with great success. It was the first book of its kind published in the United States.

Downing continued to write on the importance of linking landscaping and architecture and was well thought of in the industry. What really put him on the public gardening radar was a book he and his brother Charles wrote. The 1845 book, The Fruits and Fruit Trees of America, was the most complete one of its kind to date and led to Downing’s becoming the editor of a new periodical, the The Horticulturist and Journal of Rural Art and Rural Taste. The journal came to be his strongest influence on society and operated under the premises of horticulture, botany, entomology, pomology, rural architecture, landscape gardening, and ideas dedicated to public welfare, specifically public parks and what we now call “open space”. As an example he argued for a New York City park, which in time became Central Park, in this journal. It was also in this publication that Downing repeatedly pushed for state agricultural schools.
He held the position of editor until his death in 1852.

Downing was greatly influenced by the British “picturesque” landscape theories of the era. By the time he published the second edition of his Treatise he was a firm believer in the advantages of the picturesque landscape movement. He embraced the use of local landscape features especially “the raw materials of wood, water, and surface” and, when possible, the blending in with the local terrain instead of creating an artificial, out-of-place one. He became the mid 19th century champion of natural style landscapes and helped steer American gardeners away from the more formal, geometric lines that had dominated the 18th and early 19th centuries.

As an editor, Downing repeatedly addressed the importance of urban and suburban public gardens and parks. He felt such spaces would aid in the fostering of moral and civic virtues in the American public. In the October 1848 Horticulturist editorial “A Talk about Public Parks and Gardens,” Downing wrote that public parks would play an important role “in elevating the national character.” He also believed interacting with nature had a healing effect on mankind, wanted all people to be able to experience nature and felt city parks were vital in helping maintain a healthy community.
Downing had a wide audience through his books and editorials in the Horticulturist but his influence went beyond the readership of his publications. Private and public gardens and city parks that proliferated through out the USA during the mid 1800’s owed their existence to his ideas.

Downing did much more than this blog post will discuss so let’s move on to the plant.

The genus **Downingia is named after Andrew Jackson Downing. It contains 13 annual plants which are native to the western USA and Chile. Commonly known as calico flowers, they are noted for forming large displays of small colorful blooms around seasonal or ephemeral pools of water. Interestingly each pool will usually only host one or two species of Downingia even in areas where multiple species exist.
It’s a member of the bellflower family and the plants are 3-10″ tall.  Flower size varies but each flower has five corolla lobes or petals. The two upper petals are smaller than the three lower ones. Coloration is mainly blue/purple/pink with a little white, yellow, and black.
Downingia must cross-pollinate. To prevent accidental self-pollination, the flowers mature in stages, they go from male to female. This change is time coordinated across each patch of flowers. How this is done is still unknown.
The species is pollinated by native solitary bees.

*https://openlibrary.org/works/OL1471543W/A_treatise_on_the_theory_and_practice_of_landscape_gardening?edition=treatiseontheory01down

**https://www.wildflower.org/plants/search.php?start=0&pagecount=10

Linda’s post last week about “drought-resistant” plants made me think about drought and how different types of drought affect gardeners in different ways. In her article, she defined drought as “an unusual lack of rainfall”. This is one of four different kinds of drought that climatologists talk about, and I thought it might be interesting for you to hear about how the four (or maybe five) types of drought differ and how they affect gardeners in diverse ways. A great source of drought information across the U.S. is https://www.drought.gov/.

Meteorological drought

The first type of drought, the one Linda described last week, is what climatologists consider a meteorological drought. A meteorological drought is related to how much rain you get compared to usual conditions at your location. I like to think of it as “too many days of nice weather in a row”, since in these dry conditions, the sun is shining and it is a great time to garden, play golf, or do construction. Of course, if you don’t get rain for a long time, you start to see impacts on plants, water bodies, and wells, but meteorological drought is usually not identified in terms of impacts, just on the amount of precipitation measured over weeks, months or years. Meteorological droughts look different depending on where you are. It is possible to have drought even in a desert if rain does not fall over an unusually long time. Droughts in the Pacific Northwest might look quite different since the frequency and amount of rain looks a lot different there. In the Southeast, drought can be hard to identify by looks since even when rain does not fall for a long time, things tend to stay relatively green because in our worst droughts we still get 35 inches of rain a year. Most gardeners can cope with meteorological drought by watering their plants at appropriate intervals and reducing impacts of the dry conditions by mulching to help keep moisture in the soil.

Agricultural drought

I spend a lot of time talking about agricultural drought to the farmers and extension agents I work with, because agricultural drought is always on their mind. Agricultural drought is defined by a negative water balance that can be related to both lack of rainfall and/or high temperatures that increase evaporative water stress on growing plants. It occurs mainly in the growing season because that is when the crops are actively growing and impacts are most noticeable. A 3-week dry spell may not be a problem for most gardeners that water their plots, but if you are a dryland farmer without irrigation, you can lose an entire crop of corn for the year if the dry spell occurs when the corn is pollinating and the silk dries out before the pollen can stick to it. Often agricultural drought can occur even when there are no other impacts to us because it is subtle; most people don’t see the impacts until months later during harvest. If you have limited access to water for irrigation or very sandy soil in your garden, then you are more likely to be affected by agricultural drought since it will be harder to maintain plant health when the soil is dry.

Agricultural droughts are often related to flash droughts. Flash droughts are characterized by very rapid development or intensification over a short time period, and crops are often the first things affected because of their need for frequent watering. Flash droughts are often characterized by a lengthy dry spell coupled with very high temperatures, something that is common when you have a persistent area of high pressure right over your location.

Hydrological drought

Where agricultural drought is related to a shortage of water over time periods as short as a week to a month, hydrological drought is related to a shortage of water over months or years. Climatologists measure hydrological drought as precipitation deficits over periods that range from three months to multiple years. You can see hydrological drought in dropping stream, lake, and reservoir levels and in dropping groundwater levels if the deficit lasts long enough. A hydrological drought can occur even if no agricultural drought is observed when you get rain at frequent intervals but it is less than normal over a long time period, as long as the rainfall is enough to sustain the crops (or if it is winter, when there are not many crops growing).

Hydrological drought tends to affect gardeners’ access to water for irrigation because the long-term water deficits lead communities to enact water conservation measures to protect drinking water supplies. Most local and state governments have tiered conservation measures that get more strict as the water supplies get lower and lower. They may start by merely providing educational materials on water conservation and then progress to even-odd watering by dates or watering during overnight hours only (since there is less loss of water due to evaporation in cooler night-time temperatures). In the worst droughts, they may cut off the use of water for establishing new lawns and gardens (often with an exception for gardens that are used for food production). If a drought lasts for many years or even decades, then it is considered a megadrought, such as the one that is occurring now in the Southwest U.S. Megadroughts are related to long-period shifts in global atmospheric patterns and can lead to the abandonment of cities because of the loss of water to keep their citizens alive over time.

Socio-economic drought

Socio-economic drought is a little different than the other kinds of drought mentioned above. It is drought caused by a lack of water due to overuse, hoarding, or war. An example of a socio-economic drought might be one caused by one country damming a major river in their country to create a reservoir, keeping the river water from flowing downstream to other countries that depend on the water for agriculture or water supply. In the United States, disagreements between who is allowed to use available water often end up in court as cases like the Georgia-Florida “water war” that was recently adjudicated in the U.S. Supreme Court. Locally, disagreements about who is allowed to use the water sometimes result in tiered water pricing, where the more water you use, the higher the price. This affects gardeners who have plots that use a lot of irrigation because of the use of water features, plants with significant water needs, or lack of mulching or other methods of protecting soil moisture.

Recently, a fifth type of drought called ecological drought has been identified, since a lack of rainfall can affect natural ecosystems in ways that are distinct from gardens, farms, or watersheds. I won’t address it further here, but if you are interested in how natural ecosystems are affected by dry conditions, you will no doubt read about ecological drought in publications in the future.

Drought is a naturally occurring part of the climate across the world, and gardeners must understand the nature of drought in their area to recognize how it affects the weather and climate where they live. Linda’s article last week gives some good guidelines for how to make your garden work in your climate.

This month I continue the series on pruning with a look at pruning established landscape trees.  These are trees in the prime of life, growing well, starting to shade the garden beneath them and expanding their canopies. Various reasons can prompt the call for tree care professionals.

What reasons would we have to prune a healthy vigorous mid-aged tree? For those we have to examine what may have happened in the past. The fact that a tree is growing well does not always mean it was “selected” well. After a few years time, that cute little nursery tree is flexing its branches and spreading out and, more worryingly, upward. One of the prime reasons for pruning is to reduce the size or expansion of a tree canopy. There may be impending interference with power transmission or other utility lines. The tree may be blocking a view, it may just be frightening in its shear mass or size and pose a psychological threat to its owner. Size reduction is a frequent object of tree pruning operations.

The tree is too large for my comfort

If you find that you want to reduce size of a tree you should ask yourself is it possible and is it sustainable? Ultimately, do I have the right tree for this spot?
Size reduction pruning is a battle with tree genetics. The tree wants to achieve a designated height and the tree owner wants to limit that height. Terminal or leaders can be pruned back to a lateral branch to reduce the length of stems and branches. This kind of “thinning” is effective as long as the branch that a leader is trimmed to is large enough to resume the hormonal role for that portion of the tree. Arborists have a 1/3 rule that suggests the branch you trim back to should be at least 1/3 the diameter of the stem it is attached to. That is, you don’t trim back to a twig otherwise it is a heading cut and re-sprouting will be abundant and require more pruning. The problem with the 1/3 rule is that trees don’t respond consistently to pruning on this basis. Some will re-sprout at the cut, others will not. In any event if you embark on size reduction pruning you will likely be maintaining that strategy over the life of the tree and this may not be sustainable. Removal and replanting with a smaller tree species that can be cultivated with little or no pruning would be a more sustainable approach.

Deadwood, I see Deadwood

Deadwood is not the end of a tree or necessarily a reason to call the tree trimmer. Deadwood can serve as habitat for cavity nesting birds and is an important part of tree ecology. But dead branches that hang down and have broken from the canopy pose hazards and should be carefully removed. A dead leader can be pruned back and retained especially if woodpeckers have excavated nests that other cavity nesting birds, such as owls, will subsequently use. Of course if the deadwood is part of the active pathology of an ongoing tree disease, its removal may be warranted to prevent disease progress. This diagnosis would involve consultation with your state extension specialist or agent and or qualified arborist with training in tree diseases.

I have a tree with uncorrected branch faults

Perhaps after careful study you realize your tree has co-dominant stems or too many branches coming from one place on the main stem. Both are important branch faults that precede branch failures. Co-dominant stems look like a “slingshot for giants”, two big stems both the same size. Often they are accompanied by included bark that separates the stems. The problem is often that when the stems are large, pruning one will leave a big wound that can let in decay and decrease the life of the tree. If a codominant is 6 inches or larger, it may be best to not remove it. Or remove the entire tree thus fixing the issue. If you want to keep the tree you should choose one stem to thin and prune rather aggressively (not topped) and leave the other stem unpruned. Over time the thinned out stem will grow slower and the unpruned one faster and the codominance will decline. This strategy will require year over year pruning to achieve your goal of shifting the codominants.

If the problem is multiple branches coming from one point the correction is far more difficult. Removing branches from a cluster again provides decay entry and potentially can weaken the attachments of the other branches. Large trees (especially if a branch has already failed) with multiple attachments at the same point are likely to have a failure. The only correction for some cases is tree removal. If there is no or low risk to people or property the tree can remain as such and or pole braces installed to prevent failure. Again, failure likelihood depends greatly on the species. Elms, Oaks, Acacia, Carob, etc, all are at risk of rapid failure.

What if my tree is storm or wind damaged and needs repair?

The occurrence of severe weather events is on the rise. Intense winds, increased rain, high temperatures are all commonplace now. Trees that withstood the elements in the past can now be damaged in these storms. In every case a professional opinion on the salvage of storm damaged trees is important. Expectations for restoring an acceptable crown that is safe for the site and those that use it is highly variable. A qualified consulting arborist can guide you in working with storm damaged trees or providing an opinion on removal vs restoration. It is best to contract an arborist who has no interest in a trimming/removal operation since they do not stand to gain from an easy and profitable removal job.

I realize my tree was harmed by previous tree trimming and I want to make it better

Much like the other scenarios, growth patterns and targeted branch work can fix or resolve past insults to trees from inferior pruning . However, don’t expect to resolve all the issues in a single pruning. Often it takes years of careful work to restore the canopy of an abused tree.

I just want to have my tree thinned

If your goal is to get more light into the garden and the tree is a variety that responds well to thinning, this is great. If you don’t have a reason then this is not a legitimate pruning need. Trees don’t need to be thinned and thinning is actually detrimental to some oak species, depriving them of the inner canopy of leaves that they rely upon. Thinning slows the overall growth of trees and reduced stored carbohydrates. Extreme thinning on a regular basis can predispose trees to some fungal pathogens.

At the end of the day….

Mid size, mid life trees require no pruning. People may have reasons to prune when the tree is too large for the site, has been damaged or needs further training to develop its architecture. Trees don’t require pruning if they grow according to their genetic program. Pruning the maturing tree really seeks to undo damage or correct issues that arise in its culture. Branch faults and tree branching structure may not be apparent to every gardener so seeking a professional opinion is always worth the money if you want to be sure of your tree’s pruning needs.

I got a Facebook message early this week from a friend in Sacramento CA that said after over 200 days with no rain, she got 4.83 inches in a 24-hour period from the latest extreme rainfall that occurred over northern California. Others have reported up to a foot of rain in three days. If you follow the news, you may have heard the term “atmospheric river” used to describe the torrential rains and flooding that have occurred this week in San Francisco and other parts of Northern California. In this post, I want to explain what atmospheric rivers are and how they affect rain climatology in the Western U.S. as well as other parts of the United States and the world.

Tahquamenon Falls–Autumn. Source: Wfgc, Commons Wikimedia.

What is an “atmospheric river”?

The term “atmospheric river” first appeared in the modern scientific literature in the early 1990s. Since it was first used, there has been a lot of discussion about what the term actually means. Commonly, it is seen as a band of very moist air flowing into a coastal area, bringing the potential for a lot of rain to the region that is at the downwind end of the flow. In some respects, it is like being on the receiving end of a firehose streaming high-intensity water right towards you! After a lot of discussion by meteorologists (described in this Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society article) the official definition in the Glossary of Meteorology became:

Atmospheric river – A long, narrow, and transient corridor of strong horizontal water vapor transport that is typically associated with a low-level jet stream ahead of the cold front of an extratropical cyclone. The water vapor in atmospheric rivers is supplied by tropical and/or extratropical moisture sources. Atmospheric rivers frequently lead to heavy precipitation where they are forced upward—for example, by mountains or by ascent in the warm conveyor belt. Horizontal water vapor transport in the mid-latitudes occurs primarily in atmospheric rivers and is focused in the lower troposphere. Atmospheric rivers are the largest “rivers” of fresh water on Earth, transporting on average more than double the flow of the Amazon River.

Source: NASA Earth Observatory

Why do atmospheric rivers produce so much rain?

The strong flow of moisture into a region provides an excellent source of water vapor for the development of heavy rain, especially if it is moving into an area with flow up mountain slopes that can help storms develop vertically. That enhances the rain-producing process. The West Coast of the United States provides a perfect location for the occurrence of atmospheric rivers since there is a broad expanse of ocean to provide the water vapor, dynamic storms that concentrate the flow into bands that can stretch all the way from the Hawaiian Islands to California (which explains an alternate name, “Pineapple Express”), and mountains near the coast to provide lifting for the moist air once it comes onshore. Cliff Mass of the University of Washington often discusses them in his blog on the weather of the Pacific Northwest.

Do atmospheric rivers occur in other places?

The short answer is Yes! While historically they are discussed most often when talking about weather on the West Coast, atmospheric rivers (ARs) can and do occur in other places as well. Anywhere that has a good source of moisture plus dynamic storms with strong airflow can experience ARs. In the Southeastern U.S., we get them when strong flow from the Gulf of Mexico or the Atlantic Ocean feeds into our region, usually ahead of a strong low pressure center that provides the necessary dynamics to create a narrow band of moisture feeding into the region. According to research by University of Georgia researchers, they occur most often in the cold months of November through March but can occur in any month of the year. In the Southeast, we get about 40 events per year that are classified as ARs. I was surprised to read that there are slightly more events on the East Coast than along the Gulf of Mexico, but anywhere along the Southeast coast can be affected. No trend towards more or fewer events was seen in the 1979-2014 period.

NOAA’s Physical Sciences Laboratory’s page describing ARs says that on average, about 30-50% of annual precipitation in the west coast states occurs in just a few AR events, thus contributing to water supply. ARs move with the weather and are present somewhere on the Earth at any given time. This site has some great resources for tracking and forecasting ARs around the world.

Of course, atmospheric rivers are not the only source of heavy rain events, but they are one of the primary sources for the West Coast. In other areas, tropical systems like slow-moving hurricanes or stalled fronts can also drop a lot of rain. You can also get very heavy rains from small local systems of thunderstorms if conditions are right, especially if the storms “train” or move one after another over the same area like cars on a freight train. We saw this in the Nashville area a few weeks ago, where the heavy rains resulted in significant flooding over a few counties.

Rain garden in the Allen Centennial Gardens on the campus of the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Source: James Steakley, Commons Wikimedia.

How do atmospheric rivers and other heavy rain events affect gardeners?

If you are a gardener in the Western United States, you are already well aware of the long dry season over the summer followed by bouts of rain that can occur over the winter months. The timing of the switchover from dry to wet conditions depends on how far north you are on the coast, with the summer dry spell coming earliest in southern California and moving northward with the position of the jet stream as the summer progresses. Dealing with the effects of an AR is like any other attempt to protect your garden against heavy rainfall, and can mean proactive action to make sure that water-sensitive plants and trees are not located in low-lying areas where rain collects. This 2013 article from the Garden Professors blog on-site assessment is still good advice for planning ahead for soggy conditions by walking through your property in the rain. Designing for erosion control, such as rain gardens, can also help divert water in high-intensity rainfall.

In spite of the heavy rain that fell in this last atmospheric river event, the rainfall barely made a dent in the long-term drought that is present across a lot of the Western U.S. Drought will continue to be a part of the hydrologic cycle that affects gardeners, farmers, and water managers across that region and across the world.