What happened to this tree?

[Anne]

ok, we may not have a garden per se, but my husband does have one green passion and that's oaks. He has an ongoing obssession with bringing oak trees back to the local landscape. As part of that, we went and bought 13 developed oak trees (small ones, for oaks, only 4-5 years old) and planted them all over our backyard. It's going to look really pretty, in 20 years or so lol.

Anyway, one of them just went brown on us. Pretty sudden, and it's one out of 13, the rest are still green, though some beginning to turn brown (with fall approaching). Hubby maintains this tree must be going into winter time earlier than the other trees. We think he's in denial. What do you guys think? is there anything we can or should do for the tree?

[neetanddave]

There are boring beetles that do that to them here in the US. It's usually in the early fall, as they are looking for a home before winter. No idea of you have them there or not....

[Anne]

Well, hubby thinks this tree may be some kind of mutant oak that goes brown early lol who knows, I guess we'll know by spring time ;)

[Steve]

A test I run for tree health, especially when suspecting "mortality" (LOL), is to scratch the bark slightly. If under the bark, the tree shows some green, then it may well be you have a pin oak, for example, instead of some other variety. Nurseries are always mistagging their products, happens all the time. It could also be a shortage of water at some point which caused a problem, now just showing. Oaks take a while revealing their problems. But the layer of tree under the bark is your best indication. You can do the same for the branches above. A little scratch with a fingernail, pulling the bark back, and see how healthy it looks underneath. If it is grey or white, you may be losing it.

[Steve]

LOL, By the way, do you think you could have got a nerdier picture of Tzachi? LOL!:egypt: :lolup:

[Sar]

Awww, poor tree! :sniffle:

I was going to suggest the bark trick too - but Steve beat me to it! :lol2:

I hope that your tree isn't coming to the end of it's life and infact it is a mutant tree! :)

[Anne]

LOL, By the way, do you think you could have got a nerdier picture of Tzachi? LOL!:egypt: :lolup:

Hey! Watch it!

He was talking, walking and had the sun in his eyes! For the benefit of our female forum members I'll post a picture of his when he's not walking, talking and with the sun in his eyes, just being a wonderful dad and a great guy all around -

http://www.gosite.co.il/pics/fam5.jpg

I just noted he's wearing teeshirts of the cat welfare society in both pictures lol. The first one actually says "I take care of feral cats and proud of it!". He gets hit on all the time when he's wearing that one lol

[Karen]

Great picture of your family Anne! :) Your boys are adorable!

[LokisMum]

I agree! They'll be heart-breakers when they're bigger!

[Steve]

Great picture, Anne, lol. Are those kids cute or what? God, sometimes I sure miss babies, I swear. Sue me, it's true!