Torrey Pine Trees
Gardening Question:
Can I legally prune or cut back Torrey Pine Trees. I have three native Torrey Pines in my yard. They were growing here when my family bought property next door in 1946. My neighbors are complaining that their view is being blocked. I do not want to prune. Can I use the legality as an excuse for not trimming? These trees are very big, since they have been irrigated for the past 40 years while we have lived here. Thanks for you help with this.
Answer from Pat:
You don’t mention where you live. The best way to find out if there is a law against pruning any tree would be to ask the city government where you live. For example, there is a law in Del Mar California against cutting down Torrey pines (Pinus torreyana) but none against intelligently pruning them. However, one can cut down a tree when it is too close to a house or another building. A permit is required to cut them down.
No permit is required to prune Torrey pine trees, and in some cases it’s necessary to prune them for reasons of safety. Torrey pines are not damaged by sensible pruning and often helped by it. Where there is plentiful ground water they have even survived unwise pruning such as topping, which is never a good idea with any tree. A Torrey pine, or any tree for that matter, should not be pruned in such a way that it becomes unbalanced. It is best to prune them in the cool weather of late fall and winter months, not in summer.
Torrey pine trees often invade pipes. In the wild, they are attacked by beetles during droughts, but if growing in gardens or on irrigated hillsides they are usually healthy. They easily throw off beetle attack and can grow to enormous size. Basically, they are not a good tree for irrigated gardens since their roots invade pipes and they grow too large, sometimes with shallow roots making the trees dangerous. There are many cases of large Torrey pine trees crashing down to the ground because of shallow roots in irrigated soils. Sometimes they fall on houses and other structures. Unusually long and heavy limbs can also fall off or break and hit the ground, though still attached to the tree. For this reason it is wise to remove any branches that have stretched too far out from the trunk with a heavy load of foliage at the tip and none down the branch.
There have been some cases of Torrey pine trees in gardens suddenly crashing down to the ground in the middle of the day or night when there is not even any wind. However, trees growing in canyons where roots can grow deep to get water rarely fall and often grow to immense size, creating a phalanx of foliage that can indeed cut off views and drip quantities of sap and needles on the ground below. Wise pruning may in some cases benefit the tree and the safety of your property. (Please see the article on Care of Torrey Pine Trees elsewhere on this website.)
How often is too often to trim a Torrey Pine? Can they safely be trimmed annually?
When a large Torrey Pine Tree is obstructing a view and is trimmed to allow some view through the tree or is cut to narrow the width of the tree, will there be regrowth so that the trimming will always need to be repeated ? If so, how rapid is the regrowth?
When a large Torrey Pine is pruned to allow views through the tree, whether the tree will regrow to fill the gap depends on how the pruning is done and also might be more effective if the tree has grown unevenly so that there is a gap between two trunks. Most Torrey pines have only one central leader but in a few cases there might be two. Usually this happens if branch was lost and another branch grew upwards to become a second trunk. In this case one can sometimes see through the tree more easily if it has been pruned to open up the gap between the trunks.
In a tree with a central leader, if a view is created when one branch is removed by cutting through it at the point where that branch is attached to the tree trunk, that branch will never grow back. However if there is another branch below the branch that was removed and if the foliage on that branch is between the viewer and the desired view, then the foliage could conceivably sprout with higher twigs and needles that eventually might once again obscure the view.
You also need to realize that branches surround the tree, so even if you take out one whole branch that obscures a view on one side of a tree, others on the other side of the tree might spread up and out and obscure the view. Tree pruners often “lace out” trees in the attempt to open up the center of a tree and make it less dense with growth, but with a pine tree of any species this often results in the opposite effect since the tree will most likely put on more tip growth on the tips of branches which is likely to obscure the view even though the inside of the tree has had much twiggy growth removed.
You also ask how rapid is the re-growth if the tree is cut into a narrow shape or otherwise pruned to allow for views. There is no way to give you an accurate estimate of the rate of re-growth since it can vary depending on the amount of rainfall or other factors such as the site or the soil in which the tree grows. Torrey pines are not slow growers and if the roots of a mature tree have gone deep into the ground to reach a water source, that tree might bounce back within a year or two. Also, despite lingering drought this year (2016), most plants in Southern California are putting on a lot of growth this year and many flowering shrubs and trees are flowering more than usual. This might be due to several factors, such as rising temperatures or more carbon dioxide in the air.
It is not good for any tree to remove more than twenty percent of its foliage at one time since the bark of a tree can become sunburned.
Hope all is well. I live in Del Mar and planted around a year and half ago a six foot torrey pine on my north slope. Last summer it had a number of pine needles die off all at once. This summer it seems even worse. It does have a bubbler next to it so should be getting reasonable water yet am concerned it is losing half its pine needles (not the needles on the end but most the ones in the middle of its branches and on its young trunk). Any thoughts?
No worries!
Fortunately, it is totally natural for Torrey pine trees to drop a lot of needles, all at once, usually in early summer and it is not at all unusual for people to worry when they first notice this process in action. Sixty years ago exactly the same thing happened to me. People worry more about Torrey pines than other pine trees since this process is so sudden, visible and dramatic—much more so than with other species that shed needles more slowly.
Here is what happens: After a Torrey pine tree has put on new candles and grown a foot or more in spring, the old needles further down on the branch suddenly die, turn golden brown and fall off. This is a totally natural process and simply means the tree has grown another notch taller and the branches have grown longer and thicker. What was formerly a new “candle” on the tip of a branch, has now thickened and become part of the branch. All the nice green needles are now new ones that grew this year and the old ones have become mulch covering the ground, killing weeds, and maintaining moisture in the soil. While all this has been happening the roots that are mostly hidden from sight also have grown longer and thicker and spread out wider to stabilize the tree.
This year many more needles went brown and fell off due to heavy rains last winter creating much more tip growth than usual. It is totally understandable that you noticed and wondered what was happening.
One thing I would like to caution you about is this: You mention the fact that your tree has a bubbler. As the tree grows it is very important to move this bubbler away from the trunk. Many gardeners fail to understand that there are no feeder roots close to the truck of any tree. As mentioned above the roots spread out and thicken, and just as the needles fall off the young trunk and branches as these grow, so also do the feeder roots drop off the roots close to the trunk and new ones sprout further out. Leaving a bubbler close to the trunk of a tree leads to rot and also is a waste of water. Always water under the drip line which means the tips of the branches. That is where the feeder roots are. Once a Torrey pine is established, it needs no water except deep watering with a sprinkler set under the drip line in dry weather in fall and in coastal zones this is only needed by young trees. Thanks for asking me an interesting question the answer to which will help other folks as well.
Thanks also for enquiring about me. Yes, all is well though I am currently recovering from a fall and torn hamstrings. Other than that I am flourishing and life is good. I am busy getting paintings framed for a one-woman show in Orange County when I am 90, still gardening, writing books and articles, giving a few talks and traveling when I can. I am also always fixing up my 60-year-old house and maintaining my unique garden with its old trees, thick hedges, pergolas, arbors, paths, patios, terraces and mature plants. Other than my work, house and garden, my greatest joys are my large family and many friends, some of whom paint with me in my garden once a week.
Hi Pat,
We have a few Torrey pines that had some branches removed. I live in San Diego, CA. The tree trimming happened over a year or so ago; however, there is sap that constantly drips from the wound and hits the sidewalk. I haven’t found any good product to remove the sap yet so I was wondering if there is anyway to heal the wound?
Thanks,
Emily
Unfortunately, no sealant stops the sap and sealing the cuts is bad for the tree. Cuts that drip on pavement are a nuisance and if you clean off the drips they just come back. This is one reason to keep trees away from pavement. I suppose you could tie a piece of plastic loosely over a cut or figure out something to hang under it, like a little bucket to catch the drips. Eventually they stop but it takes years.
A developer building a house next door in old Del Mar, west of 101, just got permission from the City to remove a mature, wind-blown, natural Torrey Pine from the corner of their property. We live next door and admire the tree.
We would like to find an arborist to provide a fair assessment of the tree’s health.
Would you be able to recommend one or several such arborists?
So far as I know Del Mar is the only coastal town in San Diego County that has an ordinance against cutting down mature trees. Del Mar’s ordinance protects Torrey Pines (Pinus torreyana) and Monterey cypress (Cupressus macrocarpa) but these trees are not protected when growing within 12 feet of a house or another tree of the same species.
Regarding finding a licensed arborist, perhaps the Farm Advisor might be able to recommend one. I am sorry but recommending arborists or other professionals, such as landscape architects for example, is beyond the purview of this blog.