whats the potting media???

how hot has it been...???

whats the sun exposure..??? .. how hot does the pot get during the day

how often do you water it???

and why are you growing it in a pot ...???

and can you turn the pic

ken

Okay so the seedling is in potting soil. It was started from acorn. I will plant it in the yard this fall. I'm still not sure what happened to cause it to have a die back and leaf drop. It did go unwatered for about a week.

But anyway, it's coming back. It is leading out on the entire tree with the exception of about the last 4 to 5 inches of each branch including the leader. I don't know if that is the new growth from this spring or not. But my question is that I feel like I now need to prune off (head) the dead tips from each branch. When should I do this? How do I do this. Do I cut right at the junction where living meets dead? Do I go into the living? Do I leave a bit of dead?

Thanks in advance for your help.

You can trim off the dead stuff for aesthetics and leave just a bit of the dead. I wouldn't cut into the living wood, especially while it's stressed. It looks to me like it got too hot in the pot. Black pots absorb too much heat in the sunlight. I've had this happen to several trees, but they bounced back from it. One day I just got some white Krylon and spray painted the pots, covering the plants and dirt completely with paper towels, and putting them in a dry area for 48 hours to ensure the paint completely dried. The plants are growing better than they ever have, and the white pots look kind of cool. It costs way less than trying to buy a bunch of light colored planting containers.

I don't know why they still make black pots, it seems like someone would have figured out the draw backs. Would it cost more to make them white, or a neutral light color?

This post was edited by Ruffles78 on Sat, Aug 10, 13 at 15:21

probably root bound already in those small pots, if it gets to hot and the roots are pressed up against the container, could get scorched easily in the sun, especially in black pots, go with clay pots.

Thanks to everyone. So is the consensus to not prune and cut into the live portion of the tree?

I'll have to at some point, won't I? If I want it to keep growing properly. Get a good strong leader, etc...?

I wouldn't cut into the living portion currently. Give it time to bounce back. In the future, if it looks to be in good health, give it a trimming if you want. It appears to me that it already has a strong leader and a very nice shape. You might want to trim some of the lower branches after it gets some more height on it.

Okay sorry to keep harping on this, but I am going to need to trim the tips from each branch (including the leader since they are all dead) at some point, right. Otherwise the branches will not continue to grow, right?

So when do I do this? Next march before it leafs out?

Thanks.

DO NOT TRIM, the leaves might be dead but the branches are not, they appear to be fine. The branches, including the leader will send out new leaves. Just plant in ground and watch during spring.

If a tree big or small gets too little water or in your case probably overheated (because you watered) it will protect itself and lose its leaves kinda like it's fall. My guess is the soil and pot got too hot, and you might have even scorched it by watering it when it was so hot, instead of allowing the pot to cool down first.

Just plant in ground in fall first, then wait till spring to see what branches leaf out, then if you like trim the ones that didn't. If you want, you could mist the branches that have brown leaves on them just to keep them moist till the first frost.

Do you call Overcup a Water oak?

That is not a water oak tree. I have a huge one in my back yard and the leaves on my tree look nithing like yours.
But good luck with your plant.

It's water oak. Seedling leaves of many oak species don't even vaguely resemble those of the mature specimen; Q.nigra included. Leaf shapes on this seedling are certainly within the range of normal for Q.nigra, based on the bazillions of them that I've seen in my native AL.

I'm with the 'don't trim' crowd. At least, not right now. The dead brown leaves will drop - or be pushed off by new leaves that will almost certainly sprout. It's certainly possible that you might have some tip dieback, but I'd wait a bit to see.

Okay, this was from 2013, I revived it from the few pages ago. I just received my Q. Nigra seedling, and see what lucky means. The leaves are very confusing, and different on the same tree. I wonder if the tree ever recovered.

Trust me. This is a water oak. The acorn came from a tree in my parents yard. The tree is still alive. Just needed to get it in the ground.

Great to hear Jowall, Hope the Water oak is doing fine, it must be, you are referring to it now, nearly a year later. i just planted a baby water oak. They can have 4 different leaf types that I have seen.