eli5 If you cut down a perfectly healthy tree, at what point would the tree be considered “dead”?

Question

I would assume the fallen tree would have enough nutrients to sustain itself for a while and would eventually start dying. Most living things are dying until they’re dead but what exactly is the threshold from dying to dead for a suddenly severed tree?

In: Biology

Answer 1

I have a hedge around my yard, which appears to be an advantageous place for maple and beech saplings to sprout.

These appear to be fully un-killable Highlander trees. Every spring, I will cut them as close to the ground as I can manage… and by fall, they’ll have 3-5 feet of new growth. I can’t reasonably dig them out as that would disrupt the plants that are supposed to be there.

I consider these to be dead when they stop producing new growth.