Epicormic Shoots Melbourne

Epicormic shoots are the thin, vigorous new growths that appear straight out of a trunk or a major limb, often in clusters. Trees grow them from dormant buds sitting under the bark, and they push them out when something has gone wrong: stress, damage, sudden exposure to light, or a hard prune.

They’re a useful signal, as long as you read it correctly. What matters is why the tree has produced them.

Why epicormic shoots are weaker than they look

A normal branch grows with the tree from early on, and its wood fibres are woven into the trunk at the union. That’s what holds it on.

An epicormic shoot doesn’t have that. It emerges from a bud just under the bark, so it’s attached to the surface rather than knitted into the structure underneath. Russell Fray puts it this way: your arm is held on by a shoulder with everything meshed together, while a hair just comes out of the skin. Fine while it’s small, but the bigger and heavier it gets, the more likely it is to come away.

In practice that means when a strong wind comes through, a large epicormic limb is the one that goes first, before any of the branches that grew with the tree from the start.

What causes them

Broadly, two things.

Stress. A tree throwing a lot of epicormic growth is often telling you it’s struggling. Common causes are root damage from building work or trenching, compacted or waterlogged soil, drought, decay, or the sudden exposure that comes from neighbouring trees being removed. The shoots are the tree’s attempt to put on new foliage quickly.

Poor pruning. Cut a branch back to a bare stub with no growth point and the tree will probably throw four to six new shoots from that one cut. Do that across a whole canopy and you create a dense thicket of weak growth that needs cutting again the following season, and the season after that. Our approach to ornamental pear pruning explains how cutting to a growth point avoids exactly this.

What to do about them

Stripping every shoot off the trunk and walking away is the wrong answer. If the tree is stressed, it will do it again, and you’ve removed foliage it was relying on.

The useful sequence is to find out why first. That usually means a proper look at the whole tree, which is what a tree health check is for: canopy condition, the trunk, the root zone, and whether there’s decay or dead wood building up alongside the shoots.

From there, management is selective rather than wholesale:

• Thin the shoots out rather than removing every one, so the tree keeps some foliage
• Keep the best-placed ones where a limb is genuinely wanted, and cut the rest cleanly
• Reduce weight on any epicormic limb that’s already grown large, since those are the ones that fail
• Deal with the underlying cause where it can be dealt with, whether that’s soil, water or damage
• Come back and check, because a tree under stress needs watching rather than one visit

Left alone for long enough, some epicormic shoots do mature into functioning limbs. They’re generally more prone to snapping than the original branches, which is why the large ones are worth keeping an eye on.

Suburbs we service

Melbourne Tree Company is based in Somerville and works across the Mornington Peninsula and metropolitan Melbourne, including Mt Eliza, Frankston, the Mornington Peninsula, Carrum Downs, Bentleigh, Surrey Hills, Dandenong and surrounding suburbs.

Why choose Melbourne Tree Company

• Led by Russell Fray, a qualified arborist with over 18 years of hands-on experience
• Fully insured, with a friendly crew who treat your property with respect
• Straight advice about what your tree actually needs, and what it doesn’t
• Free onsite quotes and clear, honest pricing
• Equipped for single backyard trees through to schools, councils and commercial sites

Book a look at your tree

If your tree has started sprouting shoots along the trunk or limbs, it’s worth finding out why before deciding what to do about it. We’ll come out, assess it and give you a straight answer.

Call our friendly team on 1300 192 599 or request a free, no-obligation quote online.