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Comment by delichon | Hacker News Reader

I'm pruning trees in my yard this month, mostly pinyon pine. I looked up whether it's ok to remove pinyon branches that have no needles or if maybe they're just dormant. The consensus is: remove.

My motivation is fire suppression. But they look better and the yard feels more peaceful to me after the treatment. I don't know why. Maybe I could study with the Japanese to understand it, but I'm not sure it matters.

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Pines have a hard time pulling on the water chain due to their needle design (silhouette/waxy coating). To move water to a location on a pine branch, you usually need needles or a strong tip bud that was already emerging just as the needles were lost (i.e. the needles already drew a lot of sap to that location just before their demise). If at a given junction you can trace to a descendant shoot that is green / has needles, then the live vein traces through that junction. If no descendant shoot with needles, you're looking at dead wood and inspecting under the bark won't find any trace of green cambium, or only fading cambium.

If you are aiming for your garden to provide habitat for birds and animals, human-aestheic-ifying all the things is not a good strategy. For instance, don't underestimate the habitat value of old limbs with hollows.

I don't have a garden, I have a yard that has only volunteers growing on it. I'm aiming to reduce the fire hazard. The human-aestheic-ifying is a side effect. I'm happy that removing an old limb not only reduces the fire danger but also makes it less pleasant for rodents, insects and rattle snakes to live near my house. They have caused many thousands of dollars in damage already.

High wildfire risk here. When not if it arrives, it will destroy a lot more animal than human habitat.

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