Unstable tree

[Paul Cleaver]

unless sheltered from the wind, I would never call a 25m row of  Leylandii  safe trees 

[Gary Prentice]

4 hours ago, Paul Cleaver said:

unless sheltered from the wind, I would never call a 25m row of  Leylandii  safe trees 

Interesting comments on Leyland cypress. We don't see many that big up here (yet) so have no real experience to comment on their stability at larger heights. 

 

As an new species (evolutionary wise), being only naturally hybridised in the 1920's, is it really fair to say that they are unstable with height, or have some failed due to ground conditions and then the whole species being condemned due to that? 

 

Has anyone seen any statistics to prove/disprove the hypothesis? 

[Khriss]

Not heard that one - I wouldn't class them as unstable as they do such a bloody good job of growing ! As they aint grown commercially ( for timber ) I cannot see FC or any other body doing a survey on their stability K

[Khriss]

( Snow-loading for branch snapping maybe = Cyprus )

[tony_t3d]

My Grandparents neighbour had about 8 lelandii that Reached 30m or so and guess what? Fell over. Because all of his neighbours are in council houses they all got their gardens fixed. My grandad who is pigeon fancier and breeds love birds budgies ect had terrible damage to both of his aviaries and his patio Sefton council couldn't do anything to help him....

[Paul Cleaver]

On 12/5/2017 at 19:44, Gary Prentice said:

Interesting comments on Leyland cypress. We don't see many that big up here (yet) so have no real experience to comment on their stability at larger heights. 

 

As an new species (evolutionary wise), being only naturally hybridised in the 1920's, is it really fair to say that they are unstable with height, or have some failed due to ground conditions and then the whole species being condemned due to that? 

 

Has anyone seen any statistics to prove/disprove the hypothesis? 

Hi Gary,

I should have elaborated and kept to the topic of stability. The reason I would not call them a safe is they lose their tops when windy. As for stability - Ive noticed failure at the roots  more often when the ground is saturated

[Gary Prentice]

Big, dense sails on them Paul. I think they’re prone to compression fork failures due to incl. bark but have seen a couple that have snapped internodally for no discenable reason I.e no notch stress point of failure

 

We need more recorded British data on species specific tree failures ideally. Lots of opinions and limited empirical info to back it up