Seems like I see a good number of posts for young yard trees in new neighborhoods with splitting bark about three feet up. I have trees living and dying all around me but they seem to do it differently. When I do see problems with bark it is usually on those in my yard I have been too careless with the yard equipment around or that deer have gotten to. After the deer attacks I see good encapsulation though, these are different. I just don't see these problems three feet up many trees in parks or in my walnut thicket.

I have a couple ideas:

- Poor handling. These big transplants with their heavy burlaped rootballs get laid on their sides in trucks and get pounded around even just going down the highway. This bruises the trunks somehow and we find it a couple years later. (anyone ever just go beat a young tree with a baseball bat?)

-Sudden exposure to different conditions. Seems a good number of these on here are maples but even some oaks are affected. Could this many be damaged after being grown happily in crowded nurseries then when suddenly exposed to full sun they scald?

-Nurseries and many homeowners prune their young trees up faster and higher than I do. Could that be inviting in problems? Perhaps working with the exposure differences?

Any other ideas?