Local arborists say topping is 'the worst thing' to do to a living tree

Las Vegas horticulturists and arborists say that the popular practice of tree-topping is "the worst thing" you can do to a living tree.

Despite that, a majority of local tree-pruning firms and land owners make it a regular practice every January to hack back thousands of trees, especially the ever-spreading mulberries.

"Tree-topping wounds a tree and causes additional stress that leads to weakened branches, disease and insect-infestation," said Thomas Jaszewski, horticulturist for the Mirage and Treasure Island hotel-casinos. "It can be avoided by proper pruning."

The comments from Jaszewski, who is responsible for the well-being of more than 5,000 trees on the two Strip properties, come after a Sun story about Clark County licensing officials shutting down a tree-topping operation at Desert Winds Mobile Home Park, 3815 N. Nellis Blvd.

A.V. Tree Experts, the California-based company that was doing the work in the 107-unit park last Thursday, did not have a county license. The company got its license Friday afternoon and has resumed cutting the tops off elms as tall as 75 feet as well as other long-limbed trees.

Park officials say they are topping the old-growth trees because of liability concerns. Last year, in at least three incidents, tree limbs that broke off damaged cars and other property, they said.

They also say they want to save the trees and plan to treat diseased ones after they are topped. The theory is that the chemicals at the base won't have to travel as far.

Las Vegas tree experts on Monday said topping will neither prevent future limbs from breaking or make it easier to treat the trees. In fact, they said, topping could do exactly the opposite.

"Topping causes a lot of problems," said Dennis Swartzell, the director of grounds at UNLV and an arborist who is certified by the International Society of Aboriculture.

"If cut in a random fashion, the new branches won't be as strongly attached and will break off more easily. A systematic, orderly fashion of cutting is preferred."

Swartzell said tree-growth can be controlled by more appropriate and less stressful procedures, including the thinning out of branches, which allows more air and sunlight to get through.

Jaszewski and Swartzell said that the wounds created by the topping process do not heal properly, and that makes trees susceptible to insects at the very points where the broad cuts are made.

Las Vegas horticulturist Helen Stone wants to put a stop to tree-topping.

"Tree-topping is the worst thing you can do to a tree," Stone, publisher of the monthly newspaper "Southwest Trees & Turf" said. "It blocks the natural process of the tree's growth and promotes inner decay."

As the president-elect of the Nevada Shade Tree Council, an advisory board to the Department of Forestry, Stone said she will work this year to get next January designated as "Do Not Top Trees Month."

Also, her organization has printed 5,000 bumper stickers that read: "Topping Hurts Trees." They are available at the Nevada Cooperative Extension office at 2345 Red Rock St.

Davey Tree & Shrub Care, a national company with an office in Las Vegas, does not do tree-topping, but instead uses more sophisticated pruning techniques.

"Our practice is that we do not prune a branch unless there is a reason to do it," Mike Cooper, an ISA-certified arborist and supervisor at Davey Tree & Shrub Care, said.

Davey has several ISA-certified arborists on its local staff. Southern Nevada tree-pruning companies are not require by area municipalities or the county to have any arborists on their staffs.

Cooper said topping a tree does not make it easier to treat it with chemicals.

"There are different types of diseases that need to be identified before they can be properly treated," he said. "Sometimes, we have to send samples to our headquarters in Ohio to identify the disease before we start treating it."

Officials at Desert Winds say several of their elms, which are covered in a black substance, have Dutch elm disease.

"Dutch elm disease does not exist in Southern Nevada," Swartzell said, noting that the symptoms of the Desert Winds' elms appear to be that of wet wood disease, where a tree oozes a black substance called slime flux. Still, Swartzell said, that cannot be confirmed without proper testing, which also would determine the course of treatment.

Faye Whitman, a 32-year resident of the Desert Winds Mobile Home Park, complained to county officials after the trees in her yard were topped. She said Monday she is happy that local tree experts agree with her assessment of the situation that was reported in last Friday's Sun.

"I'm tired of seeing beautiful trees turned into a wasteland," the 69-year-old Whitman said. "What happened to the trees in my yard was wrong."

A.V. Tree Experts say they have done a proper job cutting the trees at Desert Winds. Without topping, they said, the branches would have continued to grow out of control and would have broken off during high winds and damaged homes.

The company and the park's operators maintain that the limbs will grow back and the trees will be lush and shady by next summer.

Duke Sanders, co-manager for Desert Winds with his wife, Judy, said he is pleased with the work A.V. Tree Experts has done in the park and sees nothing wrong with tree-topping.

"We had a three-foot tall mulberry that we have had topped every year (for five years)," he said. "Now it's eight-to-nine feet tall and healthy."

Tree-topping dates back to the Middle Ages, when it was discovered that forest tree branches could be pruned for firewood and would grow back the next season, Swartzell said. That became the alternative to chopping down the trees, he said.

However, scientific discoveries in recent years "have increased our knowledge of tree biology seven or eight times," Stone said.

But, whether Desert Winds' trees -- or thousands of others that each year are cut back to resemble tall stumps -- live or die is something that goes far beyond the long-tested practice of tree-topping or its advanced scientific alternatives.

"Sometimes, there is nothing you can do to save some trees," Stone said. "Like everything else, they too die of old age."

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