Pruning a pollarded willow

We had our willow pollarded last January, reducing its height by about two thirds to maybe 20ft. As you can see from the photo, it put on plenty of growth in the spring and summer that followed. I'd like to keep this tree under control as far as possible, so I was wondering if it makes sense to prune the shoots this winter, or should I wait another year before doing that?

I appreciate I will need it pollarded again at some point, but hoping to delay that point! At current height, I could still tackle it with a ladder and long reach pruner.

 

When we pollard our willows we cut them right back to the "knuckle". The new growth in the spring than comes from here and we leave them for about 3 years and then pollard back to the "knuckles" again. So on your photo we would have cut right back to have just one branch to the height of your fence. However maybe you want to keep the height higher but pollarding right back does help in future pollarding without in many cases no need of ladders.

 

Thanks for the info - and do you prune in between the pollarding years?

 

The weeping willow looks beautiful. For the other pollarded tree in the first message - I'm more used to seeing trees like that pollarded at a height between 7-10 feet. I'd be tempted (next time you reduce it) to lop off those four big limbs back to their base. The resulting growth should then hopefully give it a nice head. In the mean time I would not prune anything. Let the tree get some oomph back, and pruning it or thinning it would not add to the look.

 

I think there is some confusion regarding pollarding and pruning.
To me they are the same thing.
I like take it back each time to the same point as before, so you could say that the tree is pollarded once and after that hard pruned, I suppose.
It's something I do with most of my trees to keep them smaller and I do it every other year.

 

Thanks everyone, appreciate all your thoughts. Will cogitate further!

 

That's interesting - I hadn't realised pollarding prolongs life too. Though ours is a pussy willow rather than weeping willow, so not sure if that applies?

 

Pollarding is similar to coppicing.

- As with coppicing, only species with vigorous epicormic growth may be pollarded.
- As in coppicing, pollarding is to encourage the tree to produce new growth on a regular basis to maintain a supply of new wood for various purposes, particularly for fuel.
- "Poll" was originally a name for the top of the head, and "to poll" was a verb meaning 'to crop the hair'.
- Pollarding was preferred over coppicing in wood-pastures and other grazed areas, because animals would browse the regrowth from coppice stools.
- Depending on the use of the cut material, the length of time between cutting will vary from one year for tree hay or withies, to five years or more for larger timber. Sometimes, only some of the regrown stems may be cut in a season – this is thought to reduce the chances of death of the tree when recutting long-neglected pollards.

(all quoted from that link)

 

I'm one for an easy life, so I'd also consider pollarding it to a height where you can easily manage it yourself, if you are able, next time. Willows can grow very quickly and on ours were regularly see 10ft plus shoots per year. These shoots can get quite thick and heavy which makes tackling them on a ladder a pain.

As Shine mentions, pollarding maintains more juvinile growth but it also avoids the complication of a heavy tree canopy where wind can damage the branches and invite problems. Willows are short lived but with any cut material you can start a new tree easy enough, so they could almost be immortal.