Hi,

I have a magnolia tree in my back garden. For years we had some decking out there so we've been trimming the branches so it doesn't hang over the decking. We've now removed the decking and it's looking very sparse on one side. I'd like to stimulate it to grow back out on that side. Is there any way I can encourage new branches to grow?

There is a technique to force branching but I have not seen it used on these trees, only read about it. It is called notching that you may want to research to see if it would be effective, safe and beneficial with magnolia trees.

I don't think so, but I'd like to heat about it if such exists.

I'll follow up on that.

Thanks very much I'll look into that!!

In my experience with most trees... When the sunlight hits the trunk, you get new growth... unfortunately, the growth is not the attractive layers that the original branches were... but instead tends to be "suckers" or "water sprouts"... Usually kept trimmed off because the desired shade is gone with little likelihood of getting it back.

Of course, you could always use the limb spreaders employed with fruit trees...
https://www.starkbros.com/grow...

I don't think I'd be notching a valued tree...