bswenft, you're likely aware that the liquid fertilizers will work the quickest and fertizing a sick plant isn't recommended. Have had good success with the liquid root transplant fertilizers available at the retail nurseries.
Near here, recent municipal tree bylaw changes, to discourage residential development, seems to have encouraged tree topping by some landowners, mostly maples and alders. Not sure how the municipal authority was advised or by whom. Some of the trees do look terrible.
Kia796,The trees don't look good, but was it from a natural occurence or otherwise, just curious? Haven't seen any of the topic tree topped ,nor pics.
chimera, while some of it was from owls and magpies sitting on the leader when new shoots were soft, I must admit that the majority was our fault. Just because we're on acreage, we wanted nice evergreens at the perimeters (not so much for privacy or wind protection...just the look of YOUNG conifers, plus we got them cheap). A couple of years after planting them, a friend said pines had been a bad choice because they lose their lower branches, but that we could prune the tops when they were at ten feet so they'd "retain a dense habit". We should've (a) selected tree variety based on mature spacing requirements, and (b) selected tree variety based on mature habit, and (c) sought additional opinions from people qualified in the field! We have a few D.fir in the mix; they're lovely as they've kept their "skirts" all the way to the ground. The squirrels and birds love the ugly trees!
