About two months ago I hired a landscaping company to create a wild prairie on one part of our yard, which required replacing the top 10 inches of soil with poorer soil conducive to wild plants. A portion of this area is below a 20-year old cherry tree. During the process of removing the old topsoil, the team accidentally cut through one of the lateral roots of the cherry. I would say that the root they cut was maybe 3 inches in diameter and was about 4 feet from the trunk. I imagine they also disturbed other lateral roots in the process, but the thick one is the one I noticed.
Soon after, I saw that the leaves of the cherry looked a bit wilted. I started watering the tree in case this was due to lack of water, but this has not improved anything. And then a month ago I noticed a fungal infection (red spots) on all the leaves, and a number of them started turning red and then falling off the tree (as if it were autumn). The tree still has about ¾ of its leaves, but the wilting, infection, and leaf drops continue. The landscape company says that we should spray for the fungus in the autumn and that the tree will be back to normal in the spring.
I am not sure whether to believe the company as they have been reluctant to take full responsibility for this. Are there any fruit tree experts out there who know what is the prognosis of my tree? I wouldn’t have though that such relatively minor damage could be fatal, but also did not expect the period of shock to continue for 2 months.
And yeah, that was my question re: the soil too. Native plants would have done just fine in amended soil. I know that doesn’t help you now, but that was likely a project that didn’t need to happen, unfortunately.
I think it is a common practice. See the first and third steps about halfway down the page.
Most lawns are heavily fertilised and/or treated with herbicide and if you leave them bare, they are likely to get recolonised by the ornamental lawn grasses before the wild species can get a toehold.
The lawn grasses don’t like the poorer soil, leaving ecological space for the wild species to do their thing.
Sounds like the tree may come back, next year should tell the story.
I looked at your link. I still think the key to establishing wildflowers/prairie plants is not replacing good soil with crappy soil, but being diligent about removing weeds and wild grasses (their seeds benefit from soil disturbance and will sprout enthusiastically) and not overfertilizing.
Once you remove turf, that’s not coming back. It’s weeds including undesirable wild grasses you want to look out for.
Sounds like you’ve never had St. Augustine. Given decent conditions, it will take over.
For the OP: as I understand it, they probably should have pruned the tree back some when they cut the root. I’d get an arborist in to take a look.
How big is the tree (height, diameter at 4 feet high)? If one major root 4 feet from the tree was cut off that wouldn’t normally be enough to kill a tree, but a big open wound underground could certainly be a vector for various diseases.
I tend to agree with your landscaping company, if you treat the fungus both on the leaves and at the cut root end I think the tree should recover. If there is any way to treat the cut root to speed healing and prevent other infections, that would be a good idea too.
I removed a bunch of St. Augustine when putting in a perennial garden in Texas (used a hand power tiller to chew it up and then removed the chunks of turf/roots). Never saw a sign of it again. Of course, if there’s nearby lawn of any kind not separated well from the meadow/prairie planting, it has the potential to invade.
Here’s a site that talks about soil preparation for a wildflower/native grass site. Note that it talks about potential benefits of appropriate soil amendments for sites where topsoil had been previously removed (i.e. the builder had scraped it off and trucked it away, which happens with a lot of new homes).
I am bumping this thread because a year has passed and I wanted to give an update.
This spring, the tree put out new leaf buds and flowers, and produced a ‘normal’ crop of cherries (I say normal because I have only known the tree for a couple of years). But the leaves looked small and a bit limp, like they did last year. Now, six weeks later, about half of the leaves turned to autumn colors and have dropped, The other half is still there (for the moment).
So basically there is no real improvement that I can see since last year. I was heartened by the crop of cherries, but the leaves have me worried again. Would a dying tree produce a full crop of fruit?
I called an arborist last summer, and he said he thought the tree might bounce back this year, though he couldn’t promise it. I should add that I have been giving it water every couple of days now that it is hot and dry.
With this update, what are peoples’ thoughts? I was planning to give it another year (until after summer 2021), but if it is clear the tree is doomed, I might as well take it down this autumn and plant another. I would save a year in the process…
(in case you are wondering, my ID used to be Orville Mogul. I somehow lost it in the transition to the new board. Sigh…)
