I have 12 sweet chestnut saplings, between two and three years old, they were re-potted earlier this year, and have suddenly started loosing the green from their leaves, acquiring rust coloured spots, and looking as though they are about to die. The first photo below shows the different stages, and the second a close up of the worst affected sapling. Any ideas what may be causing it, what it is called, or what I can do about it. They are outside in the same shady spot they have been for the last 3 or so years. I was planning on planting them this November, and I am very worried about them.
Probably some sort of nutrient imbalance in the very confined root space. A Sweet Chestnut seedling growing naturally would have a taproot over a metre deep at that age, plus wide-spreading side roots. They should really have been planted out 2 winters ago ;-)
Arg.. I would have planted them out last winter, but I was a little busy, and reckoned I had planted enough trees to keep me busy, and that they would be happy if they were re-potted for another year. It sounds like the homebase compost I used (I used a differnet one in previous years, cant remember what though), your suggestion would be to feed them?
Well, I re-potted them last night in what I intended to be a 50:50 mixture of local acidic clayey soil (which the local chestnuts seem to like) and ericaceous compost so fingers crossed. Some of them defiantly seemed to have put a lot more effort into root growth than others, but i cant believe that any of them should have a 1M tap root.
Re-potting them in more acidic soil seems to have done the trick. They perked up and I finally planted them out a few days ago.
