treeseer

Cute lil burls; resemble branch cankers i see on Q macrocarpa--perennial target cankers, unknown fungus involved; supposed to be Nectria per Shigo's guess. down low where it is it could be that some kind of activity abrades them; mebbe not.

Nope, can't find any reference. Any links? Blimey i'm going blind--Roots Demystified 2008 Metamorphic Press "Not sure if I read about (in the guidance) about any pathogenic issues relating to dead woody material being available for the likes of Armillaria to exploit? Possibly it was mentioned and I missed it? i missed it too--pathogenic fungi are not as well known--or as renowned and reviled-- in oz--i'll ask sean and cassian in. .

Associated vegetation may be neutral or better, once you factor in differing root habit and distribution, symbiosis via exudates and increased microflora and microfauna, plus the fact that if people water the understory in dry times the tree will benefit. ever hear of Roots Revisited by Kourik?

The monolith thread with the logs on the ground reminded me of this fine work done by 2 fine chaps down under. The concept sells here and there in the US with perhaps more refined aesthetics, like a uniform mulch layer, and perennials for show and for pest control. cass nutrient bed.pdf

yes picus gives good gradations in color. i am using arbotom right now, its green-red range more than rainbow; waiting to see picus 3 when it gets to NA. did you get a ground level shot? i like the 3d but after adjusting ranges etc a while it's hard to say what is indeed what...remember the anne frank tree? this is rather horrifying as i saw immense iconic eucs in oz eaten away lower stem at an alarming rate...

yea i have seen all those bbc channels; give me (slightly more) free enterprise in media. I am also genuinely interested in how things REALLY are out here in the USA. I see something new everyday, and the same stuff everyday too. mine the archives at arborist news, tcia.org, etc. if you want a fairly good view; my website's biased... Veteranisation is catching on though i can tell you that.

"... your americans too will learn the benefits of a pollard culture:thumbup1: I'd rather promote pollards done by making smaller cuts and less rot. "sustainable is a word your country is learning fast, by necessity. not fast at all, in my skewed view. "and dont get me wrong, the U.K is second inline for consumptions Ah you brits are a distant 2nd in wastefulness; gluttony is the norm here, and the nonworking folk feel entitled to that lifestyle.

Gad, that's more than I would have suspected--it appears to be moving straight through to the 2 sinuses opposite the signs of infection.

Man that is ugly, what they did in your woodland. Of course not, if it fits the objective, and the maintenance budget. Lighter pruning = less sprouting = lower maintenance, right? if creating habitat for saproxylic organisms is part of the objective, then bigger cuts and semi-permanently open wounds might be desirable. Not often done in the urban realm here, X,XXX miles away. It's a hard enough sell to get people to keep trees with cavities. Making the kind of cavities with no structural implications, like those from bore cuts into the ends of branches, is about as much wounding for wildlife as we can sell. And that is rare. Heartrot is too common and too much a focal point/bugaboo around here for me to be willing to create more in a living tree that can hit a target, never mind sell that as a service.

Was the job/retention your spec? yes i did some pruning around buildings as a contractor but they dealt with the rest. If so, how often do you try and sell the biodiversity aspect to domestic clients? well this is an historical group so fungus (away from the building) is part of the milieu they promote as i see it. i also find residential clients are quite accepting outside the formal landscaped areas. the major limitation in marketing this biodiversity aspect to date has been in not proposing it , but a large minority of clients have significant issues stretching that paradigm of neatness = good and mould/bugs etc. = bad. Coring soil under cwd and coomparing that to bare ground or lawn helps open their eyes. Is the climber on it still alive? as far as i know...

Thanks for updating; interested in TO opinion. removing codoms is typically done when young; subordinating more common in older stems, ~>3" in ash imo Pollarding seems an extreme solution to an undefined problem from here. but not having seen whole tree and site and not knowing objective cannot say for sure.

True. Removal can also be a detriment to the health and safety of nearby trees and branches, as they are newly exposed. It's a site-dependent decision, which must be informed by first establishing the objective. If human safety is the objective, removing this tree might increase overall risk, so pruning may be a better option.

Absolutely true; it's common sense, and this adaptive growth is easily visible. re the cavity, arborists created it with a saw, so it seems fair to explore all other options carefully before responding to that same cavity with the same tool

"Are some of the lumps sitting on paving slabs or similar? Not sure i have seen these horse hooves on wood pieces "What was the tree species? I recall it being q laurifolia but could have been q virginiana "And do you know what the general host range in your part of the states is? Chris Luley has it listed as maples, beech, ash & 'other hardwoods' it's not uncommon; have seen it on those genera "Have you come a cross any others? Poplar, birch maybe? not birch or liriodendron; not many populus here. .

Nice to see a property following specs: trunk left as post for lights and a prop for a vine. Ecology a distant 3rd in reasons; not a big selling point here. Branches used as landscape border and aesthetics, and incidentally helps soil microflora flourish for roots of adjacent trees.

" The rot means it dosn't have a long future stretching ahead of it..." How do you know CODIT will not occur? "Also liabilities have to be borne in mind." Most definitely. The first step is assessing them, and that job is not done. If there is a question of rams horns vs. grafting (while no sign of incipient splitting indicates the latter), that can be answered with an increment core.

"If you feel inside the cavity the woundwood has rolled in against itself which I understood to mean that it could no longer close, and in worse circumstances could cause cracks. It is closing, and How do you know it has not grafted? " The cavity extends in all directions further than I can get my fingers in so there is a rot column developing. So what? The tree does not need heartwood. " Though the woundwood section around the cavity is obviously very strong. Obviously. VERY. STRONG. So what are we talking about? "The limbs above the included section have few branches for some way up and the height they would have to be reduced to for safety" What height is this? Why do they have to be reduced at all? Loss of heartwood does not always make trees unsafe--very seldom in fact. "The price for cabling and the continued inspections and maintenance implications" This price is near $0. Images can be sent to arborist for inspection, or done by binoculars in seconds. Zero mtc for life of materials, >30 years. "plus its proximity above and beside a listed and Kent historic building, The tree has history as well as other significant value. "as well as the fact it is one of a row of likely self sown ash what does it matter how it got there? The tree is there and has value. This must be considered, along with the desire to cut firewood.

Woundwood is so thick around the hole it is questionable whether the area is stronger or weaker than before. Not sure what is meant by ram's horns--could that feature also be termed "closure"? esp. if tissues are grafting... Hard to give prognosis or specs for care without seeing the whole tree, but it could be a <$300 USD support cable and/or pruning could solve any actual weakness in the fork. Not that it appears weak from this view.

Looks fungal/slime mouldy" From the ground i was told of droplets and thought I dryadeus, but the droplets are large and clear (maybe just actual water due to recent rains? Has none of the characteristics /bumpiness/features of I dryadeus, but maybe the fb is very young? "How high off the ground?" 8m or so, on the first scaffold; I. d. has a rep as a buttrotter but have seen it inside cracks on Carya illlinoinensis at similar height. .

here's a q laurifolia with foamy conk. i was told there are guttation drops

David, on re-visits I wonder if climbers notice new sprouts at nodes/laterals. On both q alba and rubra we have seen strong sprouting responses to reduction. this growth may be the definition and proof of "retrenchment". proposals to include the term/process in the u.s. pruning standard are met with "where is the data" so it is good to see these accounts of such fine pruning/mgt. work.

Re height any way to guy/tether back to another structure or the ground? Nice capping-and-boring job!

a whole tree pic and one of opposite side would be good to see. very bad fork; probe with a thin but long instrument if you want to know how bad.

Yes all looks good, but a seam/crack above an pollard point looks from waaay over here to be a concern; how did it look up close to the assessors? Seen in 7th pic in previous post. And do your guys record images up there for you?

" I wonder if your clients think the Sycamore is going to buck the trend and cure itself. In my experience things, having reached a point of being a identifieable problem, only ever get worse. Then it is a matter of when the quantified extent of the decay makes the loss of strength an unacceptable risk to the occupiers. Over to the Mathecks of this world to answer that one..." Quantifying can be done with shovel and trowel and probes, and without costly Germans, or anyone else for that matter. In the US it's common to have arbs avoid doing inspections to survey/assess tree conditions, but in the UK it seems much worse, like a class/caste system. Most consultants are just arbs who opened a book now and then just like you are, and maybe got some more letters after their name. Smart to avoid giving opinions based on quick looks. Why not bid on doing a long look 1 hour look yourself? You can do no harm removing soil and dead material. Lots to learn by seeing what's there inside. Less to learn by limiting observations to surface phenomena. See the parable about the blind men and the elephant.