The Best Time to Trim a Sycamore Tree

Time Frame

• Dead, broken or diseased branches on a sycamore tree may be pruned away any time of year. Pruning or selective trimming to shape the tree is best conducted when the plant is dormant, during the late winter to early spring time frame. Trim before the dormant buds swell and reveal tiny leaves. Because sycamores grow across such a wide expanse of the United States, pruning is completed earlier in the southern tier of states where winters are milder and new leaves emerge during March.

Safety Concerns

• When issues of safety arise concerning a sycamore tree, pruning may be appropriately conducted to alleviate the danger. Just as prompt removal of a dead or broken limb is needed to ensure no one is hurt or property damaged if the limb falls, trimming is acceptable at other times of year. Branches growing into the building facade, approaching an overhead utility line or blocking views or access to sidewalks, roads or driveways all should be pruned as soon as possible to ensure safety.

Disease Insight

• Fungal diseases are among the most pesky threats to the vitality and overall attractiveness of sycamore trees. Cool, wet weather in spring and early summer tends to exacerbate fungal issues. Anthracnose and canker causes leaf, twig and branch dieback, while powdery mildew mainly causes a whitish powdery dusting on leaves that later leads to leaf yellowing and drop. Prevent accidental spread of these fungal diseases in your landscape by sterilizing pruning equipment with rubbing alcohol or a 10 percent bleach solution. If cutting out sycamore branches with diseases, spray the pruning tool's cutting blades after each cut to ensure that you do not spread the disease to other branches as you trim across the tree, or from tree to tree.

Special Pruning Techniques

• Sycamore trees tolerate severe pruning and respond with very fast growing, densely leaved sprouts from the pruning wound area. Especially done in gardens in Europe, sycamore trees are pruned back severely each year in early spring to stumps on the tips of branches. This is called pollarding or high coppicing. Pollarding limits the size of sycamore trees and creates shorter trees with more twigs and foliage that cast denser shade or fully block views. Pleaching is another technique employed on sycamores. It involves pollarding and then weaving or intermingling the flexible sprouts that grow into basketlike weaving patterns or braided knots.