Oakland, NJ · ISA #1040A
Pruning and Trimming in Oakland, NJ and Northern Bergen County
Structural and ornamental pruning cut to the ANSI A300 standard, by a crew that never straps spurs onto a tree it is meant to keep.
Chapter 01
Cuts made to the ANSI A300 standard
Every pruning job Live Oak Tree Service runs in Oakland and Northern Bergen County follows the ANSI A300 Pruning Standard, the industry reference for where and how a cut should be placed on a living tree. That means cutting back to a lateral branch or the branch collar rather than leaving a stub, and never topping a tree, a shortcut that looks tidy for a season and then sends the canopy back weaker and more crowded than before.
Derek Biernacki, ISA Certified Arborist #1040A, trains the crew to read a tree before cutting it: which limbs are structural, which are competing for the same light, and which cuts will actually improve the tree's shape rather than just remove volume.
Live Oak Tree Service bucket truck positioned beside a Bergen County property for a pruning job
Crown reduction, elevation and balancing
Crown reduction brings an oversized canopy back down without the flat-top look of an amateur trim, crown elevation lifts the lower limbs clear of a roofline, a driveway or a walking path, and crown balancing evens out a canopy that has grown lopsided toward the light. Deadwood removal takes out dead and dying branches down to about three quarters of an inch, well past what most homeowners would think to check, because that is where the next storm finds the weak point.
Young trees get their own pruning plan, shaping the structure early so the mature tree does not need the harder corrective cuts later.
Chapter 03
No spurs in a tree we are keeping
Climbing spurs punch a wound into the bark and cambium with every step, wounds a tree can carry for years, so Live Oak never uses spurs while pruning. Spurs only go on for removals, where the tree is coming down anyway and the wounds no longer matter. It is a small distinction most homeowners in Bergen County never hear explained, and it is the difference between a pruning job that heals clean and one that leaves scars up the trunk.
Call (201) 337-3616 to have Derek's crew walk your trees and put together a pruning plan around what each one actually needs.
Pruned by an ISA Certified Arborist, #1040A. No spurs in a tree we're keeping.