Huge wound on pecan tree

[Linda Pool]

I just bought an old home that has several very productive pecan trees, the one in front has a huge gaping whole in the trunk. I have noticed ants working around the area and sprayed for them yesterday, however I also found there to be a huge colony of roaches inside the wound, I sprayed and dusted the tree trunk to do away with them but i would now like to repair the wound. Can anyone lead me in the right direction to do so? I believe this wound has been there for quite sometime ( years) because it has begun to heal. This hole is at least a foot across and the tree is at least, in my speculation, 50 years old, from stories about the house built in 1927.
Here is a picture of the wound.

 

[Urban Forester]

Wound repair is a tricky business. The reason is that sometimes its better to leave the wound open to allow air to aid in the natural healing of the tree. Also decay can be increased if the area is "closed off". Pictures would help us see what can/might be done to help this tree.

 

[Linda Pool]

I added a picture to the original post. My concern is that the decay seems to be on going, can I treat that with anything to stop the decay, even if I do nothing to the wound. This poor tree has been neglected for many years due the house being vacant for most of the last 10-15 yrs. It is just too grand of an old tree to just let it go without doing something to try and help it. There is also two smaller area's near the top where limbs have fallen, nothing to the extent of this hole. The tree produced hundreds of pounds of pecan last year, and appears to be pretty healthy other than this wound.

 

[treeseer]

the best way to slow decay is to invigorate tree health--see Mulching and Fert in my sig line.

what is that flat black stuff at the base?

if you want more help please post a pic of the entire tree, and one of the base--after moving that black stuff.

the wound appears to be closing well--I'd clean out that rot so the bottom closes better. no more poisons applied, please--better to remove the habitat than go chemical on the nuisances like ants and roaches.

 

[Linda Pool]

Here are more shots of the tree.


How do I go about removing the rot from the wound? Can I just vacuum the rot out and then spray with water to remove more of it? I have not had large trees like this before, the ones in back are very healthy, and three times as large as this one, however this one is a split trunk and one of the sides are just fine so far. I do not see the black stuff you are referring to, so I took another shot of that also. Maybe it was a shadow?

 

[treeseer]

lower left base looks like a black stemgirdling root

you need an arborist onsite to resolve decay, sidewalk and pruning issues.

 

[tomtrees58]

fill it with foam

 

[Linda Pool]

The stem on the left bottom was a small pecan tree that had came up beside the old tree and we cut it because we figured it was just a sucker.
I have not been able to find an arborist here, so I guess I can contact the county extension agent for his advice. This is a really small town..
Thanks for the advice.