Evaluating Storm Damaged Trees and Shrubs

What do you do with trees and shrubs that have been damaged by recent shrubs or that could be damaged before winter is over? The first thing to do is not automatically go and get the chainsaw and start cutting everything down.

The first thing to do is to take care of trees or limbs that may pose a hazard to life or property. Then you can remove debris and start work on removing damaged limbs and maybe even the entire tree. How do you know which trees to remove? Begin by evaluating the tree. The following are a few steps to determining if a tree should be removed or not.
- Is the tree healthy and vigorous other than the storm damage? If the tree is basically healthy, not creating a hazard and did not suffer major structural damage it should recover.
- Are major limbs broken? The larger the broken limb is the harder it will be for it to recover. If the majority of the branches are gone the tree probably should be removed.
- Has the leader been lost? The tree can live without the leader, but it will be deformed and stunted.
- Is at least 50% of the tree’s crown (branches) still intact? A tree with less than half of its branches remaining may not be able to produce enough foliage to nourish the tree through the coming growing season.
- Are there remaining branches that can form a new branch structure? The limbs that are left will grow more vigorously as the tree tries to heal itself. Check to see if the branches are in place that can fill in the holes left by broken limbs.
- How large are the wounds from broken branches? The larger the wound is the less likely that it will heal. If the wound is small compared to the size of the branch it should heal over in a couple of years.

After evaluating the tree it is decision time. Should the tree be left? Yes, if the damage is light, the tree was healthy and vigorous before, there are ample branches to replace the broken ones and keep the trees form, if the tree is young, still has a central leader and good branch structure. No, if more than 50% of the crown is lost, the tree lost the central leader, the tree is posing a risk, or the tree is old, diseased or dying from some other cause.

If you are not sure what to do and if the tree does not propose a risk or hazard then wait and see how it responds during the growing season. Remove any damaged limbs, and see what happens. Avoid allowing untrained individuals to talk you into cutting back all of the branches in an effort to avoid breakage in future storms. This method of “topping” causes many weakly attached branches to grow back from the stubs and these will tend to break out when the next storm strikes.

Information for this article was taken from the University of Missouri Extension publication, “First Aid for Storm-Damaged Trees.”