Prune it a year after transplant with the thought being you are letting the tree get as much energy next year as possible.

When it's 2' in diameter, you won't even know it had a competing leader (assuming you cut it off soon (ie. next spring before growth).

NEVER prune a recent transplant ... every leaf is a food making machine.. to help grow the roots.. to grow the future tree .. if you cut off a third of next years leaves... that aint good ....

there is never a hurry with trees ...

so???? .. is it a recent transplant... how big is it.. potted or ball and burlap ... etc ... you could add some facts ... for better answers ... as all that will tells us how long it might take.. to get fully established ....

ken

Thank you, all. Ken, to elaborate:

I planted the tree just 5 or 6 days ago. The root ball and accompanying soil was wrapped in burlap and although I haven't measured, I can give a pretty accurate estimate that the tip top of the tree to the soil surface is between 7'-8'. I removed the upper half of the burlap wrapping before coring the root ball in soil.

Hard to say what portion of the tree I would be removing if I lobbed off the branch in question, but I am guessing around 1/5 of the total branches and leaves.

PS - That is supposed to read "covering" the root ball in soil, not "coring" the root ball.

You can shorten the non-selected (to be main leader) branch to an outward-facing branchlet, ie "subordination pruning". This causes the shortened branch to behave more as a branch rather than compete to become the main leader. By doing this rather than simply removing the entire offending leader, you will see the tree eventually form what's known as a "branch collar", a swollen area where that branch exits the trunk.....which indicates a better branch union than would otherwise be the case. This is the preferred strategy. If in doubt, use the googles to look up U-Florida-Ed Gilman. Those few cryptic search terms should open up a new world of tree understanding.

+oM

Again, no need to prune now or even next year. as the tree needs leaves.

Awesome info guys. Wisconsitom, I will go after your suggested search terms in google, thank you. A final question from your experience: Based on the picture I included, do you think the slight jog in the trunk link on the leader will self-remedy after my subordination pruning? Or, as the tree grows will my main trunk always retain that jilt to the side?

No, that "defect" will be completely buried by the subsequent layers of new wood put down in each growing season. Good question but completely not something to be worried about.

+om

BTW, I myself have often counselled folks here and elsewhere to not prune newly-planted trees, for precisely the reasons cited above. But we need to put this in perspective: A very moderate adjustment of a serious structural defect-that's what having codominant stems really is-can be done with no harm to the tree. It's all a matter of degree. If you can correct this defect via making one single cut, shortening up the codominant that you don't want to end up being the main leader, the tree will suffer no set-back of any kind, at least not anything that would be measurable. What's more, you can easily see that that branch-the one you want to shorten up and make behave, is in fact a temporary branch. At least I assume so. A tree like Liriodendron, which can end up being 100 ft. tall, does not typically still need to retain a branch at human head height. I'm not saying the tree will slough it off-sometimes in open, sunny yards, the trees retain quite a few lower branches-but that you will want to remove these at a later time, so you can walk under the tree, cut your grass, etc. Looked at this way-and this is the most realistic way to look at it-it's hard to do anything wrong with that branch, since it's coming off someday anyway.

Awesome. I'm keeping your name in my rolodex wisconsitom. Thank you again.

We have two arborists in this house, and we don't agree on a few things. Likely on this we would agree on subordination pruning that one limb (but right away or later?), but I'm not sure if we'd agree on whether the entire thing can go right away or next spring/fall. It's just the nature of the beast. A couple of my slides for this Thursday's presentation state 'opinions differ strongly', as a matter of fact, to acknowledge such things in tree care. Lots of beers have been shared discussing such things, and likely will for some time to come.

I would take the practical approach and cut it off as soon as possible rather than fuss over it for several years. The setback , is immeasurable and of little consequence.

Mike

For those of you who recommend trimming sooner than later, are you proposing 'sooner' to be this fall and 'later' to mean next spring? Or is 'sooner' next spring and 'later' a full year from now?

Today.

Mike

I'm not sure if Mike, Dan, et al are saying take the entire codominant off now, or just do the subordination thing. If the former, I disagree that it should be done now, this juncture being truly codominant-that is, no branch collar has had a chance to form. Shortening up the one side will aid and abet that process, and what's more, less total foliage will be taken away if only the sub. cut is done "now", which for practical terms, could be any time between now and 3 or 4 years from now. I wouldn't wait that long myself, simply because I might lose track of it by doing so, but to the tree, I doubt it matters much.

But I might be misinterpreting, so I'll leave it at that. Like Dan said, qualified individuals can disagree over this kind of thing, but I don't hold strongly to one way or the other-so far as timing goes. I do insist, however, that it would be better for the tree to subordinate one or the other codominants, rather than totally remove one at this time. But even there, this is small-scale stuff, and the tree is likely going to be able to cope with whatever of the two gets thrown at it.

+om