Crews mobilize before deadline to prune elms

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This article was published 13/03/2024 (787 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

With less than three weeks left to go, City of Brandon staff are hard at work pruning elm trees on city-owned land this week.

Speaking to the Sun by phone on Tuesday, forestry and horticulture chargehand Stephen Clark said the province bans the pruning of elm trees for both residents and municipalities between April 1 and July 31.

That’s because pruning during that time can lead to the spread of Dutch elm disease, as the beetles that spread the fungus that cause the disease are most active.

“If we have all the diseased elms removed, that ensures that the beetles are removed as well,” Clark said.

Because equipment like saws that are used to remove trees afflicted with the disease have to be sanitized before use on healthy trees, Clark said Brandon likes to finish removal work, sanitize its tools and then proceed with pruning the remaining trees.

Over the 2023-24 season, Clark said Brandon had 718 marked Dutch elm disease trees removed from municipal property, near the Riverbank Discovery Centre and on private property. Of those, around 500 were in or around the Assiniboine River.

Those removals wrapped up in late January. While that sounds like a lot of trees, Clark said when he first started with the city eight years ago, staff removed 1,300 trees that year.

“Then it started to taper down,” he said. “Then we had a couple of drought years. That kind of puts the trees into a shutdown mode where they don’t tend to show a symptom … Simply put, all the trees were looking rough and they didn’t mark as many for a couple years there. Now, I think, just with the moisture, they’re getting the trees to bounce back now and they’re showing symptoms.”

In June and July, the province creates a list of afflicted trees, which are then passed along to the city in late September or early October. For diseased trees on private property, the city sends a letter to the owner asking for consent to come on to the property and remove them, with a contractor taking care of high-risk trees where removal could lead to damage.

Some of the pruning of healthy trees is for safety concerns, but Clark said it also helps protect them against disease.

“It’s preventative maintenance,” he said. “Ultimately what the beetles are looking for is any dead branches … that have tight bark still. We’re deadheading the trees, we’re getting any of the lower branches that might be conflicting with any larger piece of equipment, garbage trucks, graders and buildings.”

Because March 31 is a Sunday and March 29 is Good Friday, Clark said city crews are aiming to finish up their pruning by March 28, usually getting to around eight to 10 trees a day. On Monday, staff were dealing with trees on the 800 to 1100 blocks of Second, Third and Fourth streets.

Beyond needing to follow the elm-pruning ban from April through July, Clark said it’s also important not to keep or move elm wood for fires as beetles can remain dormant inside.

“It could be detrimental to a city if someone brought in a tainted piece of wood and it got out of hand,” Clark said.

» cslark@brandonsun.com

» X: @ColinSlark