Questions for French residents

[organic guy]

Just spent 2 weeks cycling Loire from source to sea.

I was completely blown away by the beauty and diversity of the pruned trees.

What do you call it, they were mainly not pollards?

Are there regional styles, who decides how they are pruned and the frequency?

What age do you start? How old can first pruning be?

Just loved seeing so much well managed woodland and wood being used.

Did you arbtalkers move to France for work or lifestyle?

Any other info would be gratefully received, would like to do some trees in front of my house which have outgrown their usefulness.

 

TIA 

OG

[Mick Dempsey]

Got any photos? What sort of trees were they?

[Mark Bolam]

They probably were pollards.

Proper pollards.

Lots of planes out there.

 

Not mature trees ‘pollarded’ with 2’ diameter topping cuts.

[AHPP]

Is there a name for espaliers that don't run along walls? Just knitted together out there in the breeze.

[sime42]

Pleaching?

[peds]

You can espalier them along wires instead of a wall, out in the open.

Cordons, too.

[AHPP]

Yeah. That sort of thing. 

[organic guy]

The trees were mainly lime and plane, but others I did not recognise, some willows.

1100 at Villandry castle which take 4 gardeners 3 months to prune each year.

Very few were trained on wires, just pruned, some had obviously been pruned to one point for a number of years then let grow out and started pruning at a new point.

Interesting the use of "pleaching", same word used for cutting the stem in hedgelaying, which does not involve cutting all the way through.

Will post pictures when I get uploaded.

[Muddy42]

Likewise, I am always really impressed with the quality of woodland management across France. They seem to continuously crop or open up small clearings and keep the species mix diverse.  

 

I have adopted a 'french pruning' technique on oaks that works really well to revive ugly multi-stemmed trees as they emerge from the tube guards. Basically in July you remove any competing leaders and brash off about a third from every branch.  This sends the sap up to the leader and the resulting fresh leader growth is phenomenal. 

 

We also have a lot to learn about conifers - compare the alps to the UK's approach of planting non-native sitka spruce in plowed furrows lines - FUGLY!

[sime42]

Heaven forbid we ever have a catastrophe like the fire that occured at Notre Dame. We'd have to resort to rebuilding with French or Eastern European Oak.

 

French Oak Beams Raise Hopes for Notre-Dame Rebuild

WOODCENTRAL.COM.AU

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