jwpowell99
New Member
Shreveport Louisiana: I have a cherrybark red oak my mother and I planted next to the corner of the house 36 yrs ago (8' away) with leaves as long as 17". The soil is hard, poorly drained clay. The trunk is about 2' in diameter at chest height. It was ringed by her moron 73 yr old ex-boyfriend 9 yrs ago because he did not want the sap dropping on his little red car. He missed 3 inches of cambium and over the last 9 years it had recovered with only a 2x3" gap left to fill in. The past five years have been record heat and drought. In the past four years I unknowingly underplanted the tree with azaleas and added excessive fill, mulch, and compost up to the buttress root flare area. I overwatered in hot soil to keep the now 8' tall azaleas healthy, always keeping the water off the healing ringed area to prevent rot. Even though the canopy is thick and growing rapidly in height and width, some of the roots and trunk at soil level have butt rot (Gandoderma) that is also growing on the mulch and twigs. The spring was the hottest and driest in history and the basidocarps have grown stunninly fast, some from flat mats to full conks in less than a week. The trunk and most of the large buttress roots are still sounding competent when struck with a rubber mallet. I have had 4 arborists (ISA) look at it and the head forester of the LSU Ag Center over the last 2 months. The first 3 saw it before the bloom of conks in the last 3 weeks and said it looked sound. The last two said it should come down before it blows onto the house. My research resulted in my diagnosis of the problem, "root causes", and the possibility of using an air knife to uncover the root collar and buttress flare, dry it out, remove the underplantings and excessive fill, improve air circulation, treat with mefenoxam fungicide, remove the conks to prevent spores flying everywhere, and after all that cut it down if the root collar is damaged signigicantly. I am disabled and taking care of a Mother who is in diapers and has Alzheimer's, and the decline of all the trees is depressing: lost 7 Japanese maples, 5 autumn glory maples are stuggling, and I lost 3 ancient pines to beetles. My neighbor lost 33 75 yr old oaks to the drought because he did not water. I am losing my favorite oak because I underplanted, overfilled, overfertilized, and over watered. The hard clay makes overwatering fatal to trees and shrubs not planted directly in clay because it does not perk.
