Let's back up a bit. We've lost four water oaks in that same location over the past several years. The eastern edge of our property was once a shady grove and now, well, it's not so shady any more. There are some pecan trees in the "grove" that should enlarge their canopy now without the competition, but I don't like to lose trees. We'll use the wood for firewood and all, but still, I'd rather have a live tree providing shade for the animals in our hot summers.
If you look around the bases of all the affected trees, you can see sawdust. I Googled it and found that the culprit is something called the Red Oak Borer and the water oak is in the red oak family. I've blogged about it previously HERE. It doesn't seem to bother other trees from what can gather. From talking to a knowledgeable tree expert, I learned that water oaks live for only 70 years. I've read elsewhere that they live for 30 years and then die for the next 40!! That's a more accurate way to state it, I guess. Well you can see the dead/dying trees below. It looks like fall, but it's not.
It ain't fall. |
I'll then cut the trees into firewood sized pieces and then split it all and stack it for firewood to be used over the next several winters. It is hard to even think about firewood at the tail-end of June, though.
Finally, I read that to treat borers you should spray permethrin all over the bark of the base of the tree. I'll have to purchase some of that and spray the remaining water oak trees in the grove to keep from losing any more of them. I should have done this before, but there's always something else going on and I was negligent in not taking care of business.
Borer Damage |
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