Question

LEANING TREE  

ANOTHER PIC   Hello Jim,

Would you please help me with my leaning tree? In the attached pictures you can see 2 trees in the front of my house (by what you told me I think they are West Indies Mahogany trees). The bigger one is very well developed, and the smaller one is leaning (btw, I don't know if this one is smaller b/c it's younger b/c I don't know their ages) but it might be overwhelmed bu the other tree. But now that I think about it, other neighbors have also 2 trees planted at the same distance or less, and they're not leaning, but their trees are not so different in size, they seem to be of the same age. The East in the pics is to the left edge of the pic, so the Sun moves during the day from the left to the right of the pic.

I regularly trim the branches of the bigger tree, mainly the ones that grow towards the smaller one, but that big guy's grown massive in the last 3 years. Nothing I've done seems enough. This "winter" (I'm in FL) I'll do some more of that when I get the time...

My concern is about the leaning tree: Is it leaning too much? Is there anything that can be done to improve/correct the leaning?

Your help is greatly appreciated

Sincerely,

Rick

Answer
The lean is not too excessive. It will not be a problem to the health of the tree. I would however prune the lower limb --this would make it appear to be leaning less. Here is the proper method of pruning a large limb. http://forestry.about.com/od/arboriculture/ss/why_prune_6.htm

You can not really correct a leaning tree without damaging the root system. But in your case there is no need to do anything to the lean. I hope this is what you were asking.