What do you think is causing this?

[Giles Hill]

This lime is developing quite a lean and has a sparse crown. I couldn't see any evidence of decay fungi - just a lot of decay with insect holes in it. The decayed wood is dry soft and dusty.

 

 

[Stephen Blair]

that buttress will of been holding a lot of weight over the years, its pretty far gone, even the epicormic is on its way out. why is the grass worn?has a mchine come through there maybe and given it a scuff, the soil looks pretty high there as if some kind of work has been carried out. the road must have lights on it, or can you see if a channel has been cut through the tarmac. thats a pretty fresh sign in the background, has the area just been re vamped at all?

[Giles Hill]

I like the way you're thinking SWB. Unfortunately I don't know the history, but this tree is part of an avenue of trees that have the same relationship to the path, but this is the only one that's in this state. I don't think any channels have been excavated recently - it's a path, not a road.

 

I guess it could have been started off by mechanical damage of some kind at some point in the past, I hadn't noticed the state of the grass and don't know if that's significant.

 

Thinking about it, it is next to a watercourse , which crosses the path - i.e. none of the other trees in the line are next to the watercourse, so that might have something to do with it.

[Stephen Blair]

jcb all the way, corner of a ditching bucket a few years back, then they have banked up some silt on it to hide it, the silt is loosing moisture in the summer hence the dryness of the area.

[Giles Hill]

There's nothing banked up against it. I can see it looks like there is in the picture, but the ground is flat between the path and the trees and there's a there's a lowered grass channel on the otherside of the trees, running parallel to the path - the ground then rises up the hill.

 

Your point about the ditching bucket sounds feasible though - I guess the tree could have taken a knock if the channel was cleared at some point.

[Giles Hill]

The only thing that's bothering me now is there must be some other factor that's affected the vigour of the tree - there dosen't appear to be any callus growth and as I mentioned earlier the canopy is very sparse.

 

Judging by the above and the lean there seems to be a major problem with the roots. I guess it could be down to root death caused by waterlogging, with water backing up the channel from the adjacent stream.

 

I don't think a load of roots have been severed by excavation, because none of the other trees in the line are in this state.

 

All guess work of course.

[Stephen Blair]

thats a huge open wound giles, maybe someone has been a bit keen with the round up, the back suckers are withered and the right hand ones are fine. someone might of given it a little squirt thinking it was knot weed.

[Lee Winger]

I'd lay money there was at sometime a bracket on that trunk

[Andy Clark]

I'd lay money there was at sometime a bracket on that trunk

 

Lee, Laetiporus sulphureus do you think??

 

The powdery rot looks along those lines.

[David Humphries]

Lee, Laetiporus sulphureus do you think??

 

The powdery rot looks along those lines.

 

 

 

Have never seen Laetiporus on Lime before Andy, have you?

Seen it on the usual suspects of Oak, Sweet Chestnut, Yew, Willow, Crataegus, Ash, Cherry & Bollards.

 

 

 

 

 

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