When should a white mulberry be pruned?
If it is being kept, prune in full dormancy, roughly January through March — mulberry bleeds heavily from late-winter and spring cuts once sap is moving. The trap is regrowth and wound response: it answers any pruning with a flush of vigorous water sprouts so a "just get it off the roof" job is back within two seasons, and cuts much over 2 inches on mulberry do not close and rot inward from the cut face.
Reading white mulberry before you cut
Mulberry rarely declines quietly; it is far more often structurally finished than sick, with decay behind old breaks, hollow stems, and bark sloughing off dead scaffolds while the rest of the tree looks vigorous. Stress is midsummer yellowing or leaf drop after a dry spell; dying is dead limbs and cavities with shelf fungi at old break points in the upper crown — and on a fast-grown, brittle species that can be well advanced while the lower canopy still looks perfectly healthy.
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