Pruning Linden Trees - Horizontal Cordon Espalier - March 2023

How old are our pair of Greenspire Linden trees that are in our yard? I'm NOT sure.  But, I know that we have them in our yard for  (coming up on) six full years - and this will be our seventh growing season.  Planted in the Summer of 2017, the have grown into their own across those six growing seasons.    The last time I showed these trees was in October when they were putting on a fall show with orange and yellow foliage.  

This past September, I documented via caliper sizing the overall growth of these trees:  they are both greater than 3" calipers now.  They went from a little bit over 1.5" to more than 3" - doubling in size since 2020.  

My plan for this year is to plant underneath these and remove the frames.  But, before I do that, I went out this weekend and began to prune some of the tops of these trees.  That top layer of the espalier is thick and full of new growth.  What kind of growth?  What would appear to be something like a waterspout that sends straight-up vertical growth.  There are A LOT of those on the top layer.

There is varying info on the right timing of pruning trees, but most often I've come to understand that doing it in 'late winter' is best - before sap starts to run.   Well...we're in late Winter, so I took off my loppers and clipped the tips of the most out-of-line limbs.  See below for post-prune:

And, here below, are what the trees look like as the buds begin to swell.