Is my serviceberry safe in a storm?
It rates intermediate for ice damage and is too small to threaten a structure, but the multi-stem habit is its weak point under glaze. Loaded stems splay outward and bend to the ground, and the typical damage is one stem splitting away at the base of the clump — usually a pruning and cabling-free repair job rather than a removal.
What pruning can and can't prevent
Prune right after it finishes blooming in spring, not during bloom. Two species-specific traps: it is in the rose family and fire blight susceptible, so cutting in warm wet spring weather opens infection courts, and heading cuts on a multi-stem clump produce a broom instead of a shape — decide early whether it is a multi-stem clump or a single-trunk tree, because converting later costs the crown.
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