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| Pretty much I have yet another Nyssa Sylvatica suffer die back then regrowth the year after it was planted. In the past I thought "boy I did something wrong planting or caring for this one". This year I'm inclined to leave the fella in place and see what happens its second year in the ground.
If I prune back the top three feet in a week or two will the lower branches all grown from what I guess are dormant buds along the trunk be firmly enough attached the tree stands some chance? Nyssa doesn't get huge huge and it isn't over my house or the road so. Oh, background. This is a grafted "wildfire" I bought locally about this time last year. The remaining sprouts there are all "wildfire" red. I did snip a couple greens which started way low. Gallon, 3 gallon pot, whatever. Amazingly NOT root bound. Just did a little teasing and it looked ready to plant. Clay base soil...10 to 6 sun...right on the edge of the wet spot in the yard...thanks to the mulch trapped in the fence it looks like the tree is planted lower than it is.
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Follow-Up Postings:
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- Posted by dan_staley 5b/SS 2b AHS 6-7 (My Page) on Tue, May 24, 11 at 1:31
| are dormant buds along the trunk be firmly enough attached the tree stands some chance? Crapshoot. Dan |
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- Posted by ken_adrian z5 (My Page) on Tue, May 24, 11 at 7:52
| reduce to one.. above the graft if possible.. and wing it the trick is cutting off the dead without knocking off the live ... perhaps cut the dead back to a foot or two high .. and worry about the precision cut in a year or two ... part of your loss problem is that trees should have been planted in very early april .... not a couple weeks before the heat of summer ... ken |
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| IMHO, let it grow as is for the summer, so that you get as much leaves as possible to photosynthesize as much as possible, so that the roots don't starve. Then next spring wait to see that they are budding properly, then select a single leader to become the new trunk. FWIW, I have done this with several trees that had various issues, and you can ultimately recover a tree in this way. Long term attachment will be fine, this is very similar to bud grafting. There will be some additional shaping in the future, but you should be able to recover your tree. Arktrees |
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- Posted by ken_adrian z5 (My Page) on Tue, May 24, 11 at 16:12
| BTW .. was that mysteriously the level of snow cover.. or dont you get snow??? do you recall any hard frost or freeze.. earlier than normal.. before the tree started shutting down in fall ... did you continue deep thorough waterings through late fall ... or too much water late in the season??? did you plant with fertilizers ... which may have triggered late lush growth instead of allowing fall shut down ... doesnt look like it.. but did you apply a late fall lawn fertilizer ??? all issues to contemplate when wondering why it failed back to that level ... ken |
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| toro, does it have live buds within the canopy or is that all dead? Both the species and 'Sheri's Cloud' started to leaf out a week ago for me. Nyssa is extremely sensative to root disturbance...although you'd think a #3 with a little teasing would be fine. |
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- Posted by toronado3800 Z6 St. Louis (My Page) on Tue, May 24, 11 at 21:44
| Thank you for the words of optimism. We will give it another year. Then assuming it does not die back again I will prune for structure. No, no fertilizer lol. That grass is entirely on its own. The location is probably 100 to 150 feet downhill from the septic though. This is the largest transplant I have done. My method for potted plants is pretty simple. Remove the zoysia from an area of soil about the size of what you see mulched. Cut the pot away, tease out the roots and plant. I do not bring it back to bare root but I do try to tease or stretch out any curling roots. Snow cover was pretty steady this winter now that you mention it Ken. We had up to a foot down at different times. Interesting. We had some solid cold spells but no real negative numbers. A solid zone six winter with much above average snow. Too much water is more probable than not enough. With the similar Nyssa aquatica I figured this one would not be that sensitive to some dampness. But heck, a regular species Acer palmatum did five forty feet away but it has been in the ground five years or so. whaas, it has buds. I have taken the pruners to a couple branches with poor structure and have found nothing but death up above. Perhaps it was just that root disturbance. Good word about the bud grafting. Makes me feel better. So my plan is cut that dead top back to about a foot above the growth next week than prune for structure next year if it doesn't die back again. Dies back again and POOF! Its getting uprooted and planted in the walnut row out back. |
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- Posted by toronado3800 Z6 St. Louis (My Page) on Sun, Oct 30, 11 at 20:46
Here is what i have this year. An attractive nyssa bush! Lol I must say the fella grew back a couple feet. Assuming it leafs out normal in the spring the plan is to cut off the lowest rung of branches. |
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| I am doing the EXACT same thing with a seedling nyssa. My nyssa bush has not turned color yet but did have 4 suckers grow over 3' this year. Good luck with her! I am taking notes. ;-) John |
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- Posted by ken_adrian z5 (My Page) on Mon, Oct 31, 11 at 8:52
| Snow cover was pretty steady this winter now that you mention it Ken. We had up to a foot down at different times. ====>>> so.. snow is a great insulator.. under the logic of get it dormant .. keep it dormant ... the part protected by the snow.. retained its viable buds ... and survived ... the part exposed to the elements.. failed .... perhaps repeated freezing and thawing over the winter.. warmish days.. darn cold nights.. throw in desiccation from the winds ... and recent transplant ... and bingo.. it dies above ... no reason. as the root mass increases.. that your little bush.. with some selective pruning.. shouldnt take off like a rocket next year ... it all kinda argues against large transplants.. this being your largest transplant ... i guess it showed you.. ken |
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| Looking good toronado. BTW, when did it stop growing? Has it had time to properly "harden off"? It looks like it did from what I can tell from the pictures, but when you get regrowth like this, sometimes they keep growing for too long, and you will end up losing the tip due to that portion not completely maturing before leaf drop. FWIW, I think you will be fine. Arktrees |
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| Ark may or may not be referring to my experience. A hard frost got the leading 2-4 leaves on each stem last week. Never stopped growing from April. It looks like it might try to push another leaf or two out on each stem still as it appears as if new leaves are trying to emerge. A little too vigorous maybe? We have had a couple more frosts since the hard freeze including last Friday night and last night. Hopefully it will slow down now. John |
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| I did think of John's Blackgum while posting, but it is a common problem when trees are trying to recover from this sort of damage. I just wanted to try to make sure that tip lose due to late growth, was not confused with the die back that occurred before. Arktrees |
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- Posted by toronado3800 Z6 St. Louis (My Page) on Mon, Oct 31, 11 at 11:01
| Thanks guys. It has gotten into the 30's here a couple times but the lantana is still growing so nothing hardy should be affected. I ASSUME the nyssa is hardening off as it is changing colors for fall. The more I think about last winter the more I think it was consistently cold which in a way is abnormal for StLouis. Nothing much below 0 F though. The Japanese maples and Prickly pear cacti did fine so it better have been transplant shock. |
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| We had a late frost that killed the central leader of my nyssa (about 3-4' section). It had began leafing out then WHAMMO hard frost as new leaves were emerging. Central leader died, canopy was riddled with small leaves and the mechanical damage from a poor staking job at the nursery was looking very bad. So I cut it way down to where the suckers were going gangbusters. Looks almost identical in shape/form to yours. We had quite a bit of snow here, too. Maybe around 8" a couple times??? We also never dipped below 0*F with our lowest low at 3*F. Are you going to take pics after the leaves fall off for pruning advice? I do not mean to hijack your thread! Tell me to go away if I am intruding :) John |
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- Posted by toronado3800 Z6 St. Louis (My Page) on Mon, Oct 31, 11 at 13:01
| Oh, no problems. My plan is to prune in the spring. Seems safer in the event something dies back or gets attacked by hungry rabbits over the winter. Figure i would like to take the branch with the highest attachment point but what if a lower one is taller? Who knows lol. |
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| My thinking is the trunk is between a quarter and a half dollar in thickness. The new growth is considerably narrower than that. I think I am going to prune to the growth nearer the ground almost out of site cause it is gonna look really ugly for a few years. I think it is a very good/prudent decision to wait until next spring to prune for the reasons you mentioned. I still need to put up a browse deterrent cage around it BUT the cage would have to big enough to keep deer out as they are the only animal that has eaten the tree so far. They did quite a bit of "natural" pruning for me about a month or so ago. |
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| Duuuuhhhhh, The other thread on storm damage just joggle my brain enough to realize this link would be useful to you guys as well. Sorry I didn't think of this sooner. Arktrees |
Here is a link that might be useful: Restoration pruning
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| ^It seems like you would follow the rules for topped/cold-damaged trees and let it grow for for a few years and then pick a desired stem to be the leader. |
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- Posted by toronado3800 Z6 St. Louis (My Page) on Tue, Nov 1, 11 at 11:43
| Now that is a pretty decent link! I especially like the pictures! So think it says i should cut off the bottom third of the new growth? |
Here is a link that might be useful: curbing
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| Link is b0rkEd toro |
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- Posted by toronado3800 Z6 St. Louis (My Page) on Tue, Jul 3, 12 at 21:15
| Arktrees, you asked about my nyssa. It is doing ok. I snipped off a couple slow growing but highly placed buds. The old trunk wood was half dead where they were attached I found. Its back to maybe five foot tall (1.66 meters Resin). The japanese beetles are hitting it up still and just now after our month of drought do I see some burning foliage. Of course on what will probably be my choice as a leader lol. |
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- Posted by toronado3800 Z6 St. Louis (My Page) on Tue, Jul 3, 12 at 21:18
| Arktrees, how is yours doing? Your weather is equally hot and dry I believe. |
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| Toronado, Sorry for the LONG delay. Looks like your tree is doing much better. Now is a hard part though, choosing a leader. It's hard to cut off all that nice new growth so that you will have a more structurally sound tree. I had to do this with our Paperbark. It will be a a number of years before it looks "normal". Our Blackgum is doing well. It is next to a drainage ditch, that while dry since April, is a low point for some extra water to collect. I've also made sure it's gotten supplemental water weekly since the worst of the heat and dry have hit. We were -11.5" (56% of normal)of rain on the year last week, but got a good rain over the weekend. Now were only 10" below normal. Watch for possible cankers on your tree. I've had to prune out a couple of small cankers over the last couple years, one of which removed the central leader 2 years ago. I think the canker problem is due to the tree being highly stressed when planted from being VERY pot bound, followed by me hacking the crap out of the root system. It sat for a couple years, but is growing nicely now. I established a new dominate leader, that has put on about 2' of growth so far this year, with a second flush of growth likely for later in the summer. Arktrees |
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| Well... this late winter/early spring before bud swell, I selected the uppermost growth to be the leader. It was not the most vigorous sprout by quite a bit. Sprouts from the base originating a foot or more below this one were about 2' longer at the end of the selected leader growth. I then removed some of the sprouts with poor attachment and then trimmed the remaining sprouts back to a horizontal branch all at least 6-8" below the selected leader tip. This is what has happened this growing season. Looks all too familiar... the new growth from below just grows too darn fast for the selected leader. Advice appreciated otherwise I will just redo what I did this past spring until the new leader is too tall to be out grown by the sprouts.
John |
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| Forgot to add the deer have already top pruned the bush this year although it shot out more new growth and the damage is no longer visible. |
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| Obviously, the selected leader hasn't established goo apical (top) dominance over other buds. Also the fact that it is not growing as fast, and has not from the beginning, COULD be a clue that it's vascular connection to the root system, may not be completely intact. Having been in the ground a while now, at the end of the season you potentially could be able to see differences in the way the remnant trunk adds caliper (i.e. a side that has obviously not added caliper) if you have dead tissue. From your description, you possible have one side living (with the selected leader) and one side not. In the end you may have to select one of the other shoots instead for best results. If however, the above is not the case, I would likely completely remove the other shoots (next spring or late winter), so that everything gets channeled into my leader (next spring), and it's branching. If you do this, there will likely be more buds sprouting from around where you removed the other shoots, but if you remove those as they form, then the leader will have an easier time to attaining dominance, and once it does and grows enough leaves, they will stop sprouting. I had to remove some low branches from our Acer trifloum last winter. Many new sprouts formed around where the old branches were attached. I removed them about 3X, and there have been none since. Arktrees |
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- Posted by toronado3800 Z6 St. Louis (My Page) on Tue, Jul 10, 12 at 12:17
| John, the top branch of mine only put on six inches of growth where one under it was maybe two feet tall. So I pruned just below the top branch. Upon inspection there was a good amount of dead wood in that inch thick trunk. Maybe that is happening in yours. I suppose my dieback did not end at an exact point but ended gradually. |
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| Thanks guys. I got in there yesterday and took a look. Sure enough, the branches I pruned to lateral branches this spring are nearly as thick as the top of the trunk stub so it probably is not getting good nutrient flow that high. When I pruned it last year, I also removed about 2" above the leader shoot and there was a lot of dead wood in that section but everything below the chosen leader look good at the time. John |
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| John, I my experience, it is not unusual for there to be additional death of a branch once pruned. I did something similar to our Smoketree. Made sure I cut only at all green wood, just above a new growing point that was vigorous. Guess what, yeap, on the side opposite the the shoot, there is a strip of tissue death 2-3 inches long. It is not encapsulating it. So IMHO, it's not unusual. If you notice on plants fresh from a tree farm that have been pruned to create a new leader, there is almost always about a 1" stub beyond where the shoot was selected, and my guess the above is the reason why. Arktrees |
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- Posted by toronado3800 Z6 St. Louis (My Page) on Sat, Oct 27, 12 at 16:45
| John, how is yours looking this fall? Mine did pretty well with the drought. To be fair I did water the nyssa a bit but only after my Metasequoia dropped its first set of foliage and Cornus controversa started wilting. Perhaps because the roots have an additional couple years of growth on the foliage but it never looked sick this summer. Deer browsing pending I am going to prune about a couple of the would be leaders away in the spring and see if it doesn't make a tree yet. It is kinda surprising me how late my small fella is staying green. The big regular nyssas in my sister's neighborhood are in full fall color. Perhaps because of the cultivar's southern roots (southern scion should I say lol?) or perhaps just because sometimes smaller trees seem to stay green longer.
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| Toro, I also have noticed growth from blackgum suckers stays green very, very late. Last year mine never even changed. Just stayed on the tree until frost finally knocked them off. It is doing similar this year staying mostly green so far. There was some color but two consecutive nights in the mid to upper 20's browned the leaves that had color. The rest are still just as green as can be. Mine is now about 6' and above the deer browse level. That is a solid 6' of growth in two growing seasons NOT TO MENTION all the current leaders were pruned about 2' shorter than they were at the end of last year as I was encouraging one leader and trying to force the pruned ones into lateral growth. That didn't work out so well. On all the pruned stems, a bud (or 2 in some cases) just apical to the lateral branch shot up and made a new leader(s). Take note how many crossing branches and new growth there is even after a heavy pruning this spring. The pruning is now only noticeable at the lateral/leader junction. Also note how the suckers are now as thick or thicker than what was the central leader trunk. This tree has been vigorous to put it mildly. Once I get this thing in tree form, its gonna fly! But getting it to that point has not been easy. Still, a fun project in my early arbor education =)
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| Hey Guys, Just a little FYI. Your trees were transplanted AND had large canopy lose. I would not expect normal fall coloration (whatever that is with Wildfire) for at least a couple years yet. To give you examples, our seedling Blackgum did not color at all for a couple years after planting, and it has gotten better each year since. The biggest Blackgum I know is oustide the building where my significant other works. Probable a 20"+ trunk. She has worked there for 20+ years, and said it always turned the brightest purest red every year that you have ever seen until.......... after the ice storm of Jan 2009 where it took MAJOR damage. Luckily the tree was able to be saved, but it lost probable 40-50% of it's canopy. It has had next to no fall color since until this year, it began to developed some. It has taken a few years of it pouring all it's energy into regenerating lost canopy, that it did not spend any generating fall color. So I would expect your trees to generate fall color in the next couple of year. JMHO. Arktrees |
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| Your nyssa's shoots are extra invigorated because of it having lost its top. It will take a while before the growth becomes more "normal", i.e. when the roots and crown are in better balance. As far as getting it into a normal tree shape, you want to gradually cut out the other suckers FROM THE BASE over a period of several years. You can limit the growth on the others you intend to cut, but haven't cut yet, with some top pruning. |
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- Posted by toronado3800 Z6 St. Louis (My Page) on Wed, May 22, 13 at 0:15
| Looks like another spring of good growth. Man this fella is red. Rivaling my nearby crabapple. I removed a couple of the side branches after I could tell the buds at the leaf tips made it through winter and before the tree broke dormancy. Ignore the mess of a lawn. Tomorrow if I get home from work early enough I promise I will mow, and maybe trim.....at least mow lol. |
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