No comment on fertilization (except that I wouldn't feed 'em, myself) but shooting from the hip - and from the size of the exit holes, maybe carpenterworm?
hortster

Here is a link that might be useful: Carpenterworm

John,
The stuff on the Harvest Gold Crabapple (third pic from the bottom) and the last two pictures appear to be the same necrotic lesions I am dealing with. Notice that there is no callus forming along the edge of those necrotic areas. They are black sunken, and without any signs along the edge that the trees are able to resist the pathogen. If left alone the bark will crack and split above these areas. I know another person here in my area that it seeing the same thing on their crabapple.

Arktrees

Hortster,

Exit holes on my trees are only ~2mm and are too small for the exit holes of carpenter worm per the website you provided. I will have to measure the exact dimensions when I get home. These holes ALL appeared within the last 2 days. I watered everything Saturday and began peeling off some of the diseased bark at that time. I did not notice 1 single exit hole. Diseased bark has been apparent for almost a month. We had a very nice soaking rain for a week near the end of August and I noticed the bark appearance while doing a walk-through the following week. I really think it all happened during the day yesterday/overnight last night... on all of them. Talk about nature's timing lol

Ark,

NOOOOOO! That is one of my favorite trees. It does have an exit hole that is a little hard to see in the pic with the lesion higher up. It also has a large lesion on the bottom. No hole down there yet. Damn it I wanted to keep that tree!

{{gwi:431005}}
By jp_42_82 at 2011-09-12

Looks like it started down at the graft union. It was certainly more widespread on our Harvest Gold near the graft union. Same thing has happened on our Scarlet Brandywine, and PrairieFire crabapples. Both are considered resistant to fireblight. But I did find where Botryosphaeria canker does affect crabapples as well as redbuds. Also found where it was listed as a potential pathogen to Red Maple. Still not certain it is what I have, and that was why I posted the other thread.

Our Harvest Gold was much loved by my significant other as well, but alas it had to go. I'm beginning to think that is where the problem originated.

Arktrees

j0nd03, I was looking at an apparent hole at the top of the wound in the fifth picture and bottom of the wound in the last picture. They looked like carpenterworm sized holes in the pix. Guess they aren't holes at all.
arktrees, folks around here have gone nuts planting Prairifire crab as it is a recommended tree on lists from extension and the KS forest service. Said to have excellent resistance to rust, scab, fireblight and mildew. They ought to have a fifth catagory for canker. Just like white flowering pear, too many have been planted because folks want their striking pinkish-red flowers making it easier for disease to spread. I will vouch that Prairifire is "canker bait" as I have watched the disease spread and become ubiquitous in this neck of the woods.
hortster

I have a Katsura that has a black like burn with the bark splitting like your crabapple. I'm shocked to see this on this particular tree. I'll take a pic to compare.

Thanks for the info hortser. Any suggestions as to what cultivars might be more resistant to canker? I told the other half, and she doesn't want to do this again with the same cultivars, as she doesn't want to lose them again if possible. Perhaps it would be better to just replace in the spring with crabs that aren't as common in hopes that the genetic cultivar variation would be beneficial.

Thanks again,
Arktrees

Went out to check on the willow oak I was unsure about and found this:

{{gwi:431006}}
By jp_42_82 at 2011-09-15

4 distinct lesions... I contacted the county extension today but the one I needed to talk to was out of the office. He should get in touch with me tomorrow and hopefully we can get this figured out. I am hedging on stress from our late freeze, 2+' rain in 1.5 months, and historic hot dry summer making so many trees vulnerable. That is now quercus, malus, acer, and cercis all seemingly affected by the same pathogen. I do wonder if it something brought in from a nursery where I bought one of the trees as Ark suspects with the Harvest Gold crabapple.

All of the affected trees appear otherwise healthy relating to their canopy and leaf texture compared to trees that look unaffected.

I will be sure to post the findings.

John

Are there callus developing? Almost looks like it was mechanical damage, and bark is just now falling away. If you have a camera with a Macro focus, it would help.

Arktrees

A number of these pictures obviously show canker. BUT, the last picture and a number of others seem to show healing wounds from what I see as borer damage, not mechanical damage, including this last picture.
I would bet that inspection under the bark would show callus reforming. I have seen this type of damage and healing at the nursery. What thinkest thou, arktrees?
Also, what are native seedlings that have not "been cared for" around the property showing? Any of the same?
hortster

First, my last reply was to the Willow Oak only in the newest posted pic. I neglected to specify that. Also I don't have just a whole lot of experience with borers, but I can certainly go along with those for many of them. Except for those few that I specified about, they certainly don't look like canker's to me, and that includes the Willow Oak in the last picture. The newest pic of the Willow Oak "appears" to have a callus under the edge of the bark, which was the reason I was asking about closer pictures, and if John could see one there. If there is a callus on the Willow Oak closing the wholes, I would not worry about it too much, except for perhaps using a systemic insecticide for next year to try to head off any more problems until the trees with borer type damage have enough time to recover from transplanting, close wounds, at which time they should not need any help resist borers id conditions are reasonable otherwise. Conditions this year have simply been heavily stacked against plants, and those newly planted in particular. Several of my trees developed issues this year. Some minor, some requiring removal, some remain to be seen. I lost two Kousa dogwoods to borer's, and they aren't supposed to be much bothered by those. At least I got to see to it that the borer's died as well. :O)

Arktree

I will make better pics my Saturday project. We are having a yard sale today and tomorrow so I can't venture far from the house anyway. It is not apparent on the pics b/c I didn't label them, but all the red maples I checked have formed a callous, while the HG crabapple has not. The lesion border is actually a florescent pinkish red. I will try to capture that in a pic. That tree has the showiest flamboyant bark of any tree I have seen locally. The willow oak and the redbud, I am not sure about callous formation. As for mechanical injury, I planted two willow oaks this spring and didn't notice anything at that time. The one not in the pic defoliated this past summer and has now re-leafed. The one in the pic never lost a single leaf BUT I did notice ants drinking sap out of the lesion before I knew it was there. They looked like cows at a watering hole. I thought at the time they were the ones that caused a small opening in the bark as it wasn't a hole per say, just a small tear in the bark. I will remove diseased bark and check for borer holes tomorrow also.

Thanks again

John

John,
I have to wonder if perhaps part of all this is "wet wood". I have an ABM that is well established, has grown allot, that had some wet wood like secretions from a pruning wound. Several other trees had the same story. All well established, never having had any issues before. I attribute that to simply too many extremes generating far too much stress.

Arktrees

I do have "... some wet wood like secretions from a pruning wound" on a couple of the larger AB maples near their base around the house. I was curious about that and it sounds like that is no big deal. So one less thing to lose sleep over lol

I just got off the phone with the county extension service. He was pretty sure it was stress induced from our weather. I told him I was giving these ~1" caliper trees 5-10 gallons/week this past summer and he said that was not nearly enough. It was the best I could do, though. He rec'd to leave everything in the ground until next year and remove any that fail to leaf out or leaf out in a manner that exhibits unacceptable form disfigurement. He also said this is most common in the bottom 1/3 of young trees. That is exactly where it is occurring.

He stated that 1" caliper trees were too large for the average homeowner. Anything in a pot larger than 3 gallons was too big. I did get a little... frustrated when he said that. I told him nearly everything for sale at retail was at least that big or larger. He said I should have planted seedlings from the forest service. That is OK if you don't mind waiting and what you want is available in their somewhat limited offerings. Whatever... I had a lot of failures even though I made sure to do everything rec'd here at GW planting tech wise. Maybe I don't know as much as I think I do lol

I wonder if the SWO that had the black stuff on it was suffering from something similar way back when earlier this spring?

Anyhoo, pics still coming tomorrow. He was a nice enough fellow who knew his stuff, but I still trust yall more ;-) Especially since he did not see any pics or take a sample.

John

Oh John, your poor trees! As if this summer hasn't been nightmare enough, I sure hope they can overcome those scary looking sores.

Does the forset service ever have Honey Gold crabapple seedlings? ;)

Oops, "Harvest" Gold, not honey. lol