Random Facts About You ....number 59

rained here on Thursday....ive been watering like crazy in the garden....I have strawberries on my baby plant

 

its breaking open some kinda sea shell.. smart bird.

 

What kind of bird is that? Is that a roadrunner? That might be a dumb question but it kind of looks like the old cartoon.

 

Red-Legged Seriema..

 

Beep Beep.........



Cheers Glen.

 

I had to look up what it means to "elevate a tree". When my parents bought their condo a dozen years ago they had a beautiful evergreen tree about 20 feet behind their living room, outside the glass doors. They also had a bird feeder. Mom used to love watching the birds come for food and fly to the tree if they perceived danger. After Mom died Dad gave the bird feeder to my brother. The grounds crew that cuts the grass etc. "elevated" that tree and left many bare branches sticking out 2-3 feet from the trunk. It looks absolutely ugly. It was such a beautiful tree. I hate stupid people.

 

Yeah.....evergreen trees really aren't meant to be elevated. And on trees that you would elevate....there are a lot of wrong ways to do it.

 

There is a Blue Spruce at the cemetery that was magnificent. Someone decided to remove the branches six feet up. Every time I see it now I want to cry. It is not like there was grass to cut under the tree. It just has mulch under it now.

 

On my property, and surrounding properties also, there's a fungal problem attacking Blue Spruce... It's actually multiple fungal infections at the same time. It's starts at the bottom of the tree and works it's way up killing off branches as it goes. Removal of lower branches is a must... Unfortunately. If the tree is young enough for a male deer to get his antlers around the trunk he will rub the bark off and kill the tree. So after pruning I need to put a wire basket around the trunk. The older trees don't have that deer problem but it's just un-natural for Blue Spruce to be limbed up that way....


So far not all of the Blue Spruce are affected, but my neighbor across the street had to cut his all down this spring (overkill, but it's his yard)

 

YES!!! I don't know if they do what I'm going to describe everywhere but lots of people/businesses do it here...which is to CUT (not trim but lop) down to almost nothing crepe myrtles. I call it crepe murder. The poor trees sometimes die and sometimes they will flower out. I think the people/businesses that do this never wanted a tree but a bush...so why not just get a bush?!! For almost 2 yrs. I worked as a "yardener"...I had my own business cards and everything. lol Y'all would not believe how many people wanted me to do this to their crepe myrtles. The last year I worked doing that I refused to do it. I also didn't have the tools to do such work with; but such people would have been happy if I'd just chopped their beautiful tree/bushes down with a dull hatchet.

Some people shouldn't be allowed to have animals OR plants or trees. lol

What stupid jackasses. A Blue Spruce is so beautiful, especially when it gets as tall as this one might be.

Stupid jackasses

 

"Raise the canopy", is that what we're talking about?

People will cut off all the lower branches of trees in their yard to a certain height so the house can be seen or they can walk around or so they can mow.

It looks very formal and strange to me.

I like my stuff natural. I like my screen of trees and bushes.

 

Lynn....that is commonly known as "topping", also known technically as "pollarding" although the method of pollarding originated to produce a somewhat different result (in a different time/place and tree species) than what most people are thinking of in the US when topping a tree. Topping actually does have a purpose (ex: apple orchards have reasons for topping trees) but most of the time it's done for the wrong reasons, it won't give the customer what they're really looking for in the end (in fact, the tree will become much more likely to fail), the tree will never recover properly and it's really, really bad and stressful to the tree. I'm talking about larger trees in my hardiness zone. We don't have crepe myrtles so I'm unfamiliar with them but some smaller trees and shrubs can handle it better than others.

Aeri.....yup, raising the canopy. Either term is correct. I am against people just raising the hell out of the canopy or doing this or that just because they think it looks better. I don't fault people for not knowing how plants and trees work but as arborists, it's our job to educate customers about what is good for their trees and what is harmful and/or a waste of time. Trees have a certain amount of foliage for a reason and how much is removed matters. Of course, some people think they know more and better and they won't listen. We just don't work for those people. There are plenty of cheap, shitty operators out there who will do whatever you want for a buck. Call them. I have politely declined my fair share of jobs for that reason.

 

That might be something you can treat for pretty cheap if you can figure out what you're dealing with. I know some university ag extensions will test samples for free and offer solutions. It might be worth a phone call to see if you can send something in for analysis.

 

The Ohio State extension service hasn't found anything that works... There are 3 fungi involved plus stress. The stress is climate related, more than likely, and the third fungi they have no idea what it is. The typical treatments aren't working.

 

up here its the beetles killing certain trees...you can tell when you hit a bad spot evertything is bare almost like a fire went through

also the paper birch all seem to be dying...dont know why

 

Borers hit all the Ash trees here... Wiped out the species in a matter of years.

 

Pine beetles came through here. I guess that's how pine forests turn into hardwood forests.

 

I appreciate all the tree talk.

Ty.....I am well aware of the Ash borer issue and what it's left in its wake. We're just kind of getting into that here. I'm currently advising customers to wait and see for just a while longer. There is an initial and then a residual fatality rate but we really aren't into it so far just yet that we can say our experience will be the same as areas east of the Mississippi river (IMO). There are cities (including my own) that are removing many Ash trees on city property simply because it makes good sense in terms of supply and demand later. I'm really hoping we might not lose as many trees as places east of us. I realize that we will lose many of them but I'm not yet convinced that we need to eradicate them before they are dead. We still have plenty of American Elms decades after Dutch Elm Disease killed plenty of them....and we still have Dutch Elm Disease.....and we have treatments. So I think we need to be logical and not over-react and feel like we need to remove every Ash tree next week.

 

ok...here's more tree talk

Y'all remember the Bay tree I whined about last year? How it up and died in like 3 days? I left one 3" sprout that was still green at the bottom, and just let it grow.

I contacted the local (Clemson) extension about it and since it isn't native to here, they just basically told me they dealt with trees indigenous to the area. LOL! I think I happened to get hold of a jackass that didn't feel like fooling with me.

Well, I never cut the tree down...it is in a very large container. And when I say tree, keep in mind this is a very slow growing tree. After 15 yrs it wasn't even 6 ft tall, and there weren't multiple branches.

Anyway...this tree is now sprouting all around from the bottom and I'm seriously not wanting to cut the "dead tree" down since now I have all these sprouts coming up. Nice and leafy, growing faster than less than 6 ft in 15 yrs fast.

Any thoughts?


edit: There were a number of branches, but not what one typically thinks of a tree having, if that makes sense.

 

On a completely different topic.....we spent time today with our Palestinian friend who is an exchange student. We spend as much time as we can with her. We went out for lunch and thought maybe it would be the last time we saw each other for now. But then we remembered that I promised to take her kayaking before she has to go home and we decided to go this coming week (she has to go home after this week). So I have to take Thursday afternoon off of work to go boating....poor me!!

But really....we've kind of become different parental figures to her. My wife knows her through work. She is such a great person and she is so open and honest. So we dropped her off at "home" today and she was very happy to say "This isn't a 'Good-bye day'. I'll see you soon!" and she ran down the driveway and into the house. Honestly.....I almost cried. She's such a beautiful person and I'm going to miss her a lot. But we'll go boating this week and we'll see each other again in a different part of the world later. I promised that.