Backyard Wisdom, October/November 2017
by: Gilbert A Smith, ISA Board Certified Master Arborist

Sixty years ago when I was a young sprout, my mother taught me to remove all of the little shoots that came up around the base of our French Hybrid Lilac so it would flower well. The lesson from her was that suckers “sucked” the “juice” out of the Lilac. Many old fashioned landscapers still do this.  

When I was being trained as an arborist fifty years ago I was taught to remove all the suckers from the root crown, trunk and branches of the trees because I was taught it is healthier for the tree and that it looked better.