It started with a cut

[Dean Lofthouse]

It started with a cut, never thought it would come to this.......

 

Did this Beech yesterday as an emergency call out, lost a large limb which fell onto next doors car. I went out and set the mewp up sunday and had a quick look.

 

It used to be a 4 stemmer and in the recent past one stem has been remove. This, imo has led to rot you can see in the photos, traveling down the stem and leading to the failure of the stem which was below the pruning cut.

 

The crown was sparsely foliated which I had noticed a week before when I was working a few doors down.

 

I want opinions on whether this could have been avoided by leaving a long stub instead of leaving none.

[stihllearning]

i've left a stub on beech before when the BBR wasnt odvious,whent back a year later and put the correct pruning cut on it then

[Johny Walker]

looks like fire blite dean !!!!! or bloody big squirrel

[18 stoner]

As for me Dean, i think in this particular case the earlier pruning cut would not have made much difference to this outcome. The dead on the back of the stem seems to be away from the callus around the older wound. (hope that makes sense!)

 

I like Stihllearnings idea of returning when the ridge is more evident.

[Treewarrior]

As for me Dean, i think in this particular case the earlier pruning cut would not have made much difference to this outcome. The dead on the back of the stem seems to be away from the callus around the older wound. (hope that makes sense!)

 

I like Stihllearnings idea of returning when the ridge is more evident.

One of the excellent things about arbtalk..............you learn things. Thanks chaps, keep the knowledge coming.

[Mesterh]

Looks to me like it has had some disease rather than rot from the old wound, that coupled with what looks like included bark/poor branch union.

[Dean Lofthouse]

The included bark is nowhere near as bad as it looks on the photo and the unions were thicker than they appear.

 

I did mean to take a load of slices through and photo them to show how the rot had travelled through but the heavens well and truely opened and I got a right soaking so I couldn't use the camera.

 

The slices through clearly show the rot extending down from the pruning cut, compartmented off but travelling vertically down the stem a long way, but down the back side of the stem as shown on the photo

 

If you look closely at the pruning cut, you can see the callus has formed twice, it looks as though it had started to close over then it has been cut again and started forming again, either that or there was a double branch union that has been cut off through the ridge and collar ??

Edited July 7, 2009 by Dean Lofthouse

[Mesterh]

The way the bark is peeling off looks like some kind of infection, no Monkeyd will have the answer

[David Humphries]

The way the bark is peeling off looks like some kind of infection, no Monkeyd will have the answer

 

Or maybe not !

 

Do you not know, only Smarties have the answer

 

 

 

 

 

 

.

[Mark Bolam]

That was a big wound to leave on a Beech.

 

They don't like it up 'em IMO.