PRUNING SHADE TREES An ideal shade tree has the character of its species or variety, as the oval of the hard maple or the broad dome of the white oak or the fan top of the elm. It has the greatest possible foliage mass on a sturdy framework of trunk and limbs. To keep this dome intact, losing just enough for the health of the leaves, is the object of pruning. It needs only the removal of dead and broken limbs and of those that interfere and crowd. Wayward limbs
are cut back to preserve the tree's symmetry. Long, heavy limbs that threaten to split away from the trunk by their weight are cut back.
In fact, shade trees take care of themselves almost altogether. Accidents to their limbs are usually responsible for conditions that make pruning necessary.