I was wondering if anyone could help me out. My silver maple seems to have some type of fungus that's attacked it. The bark seems to be decaying in several spots on the tree. The tree produces leaves every summer, but some of the leaves wither away around early summer. I have gotten conflicting opinions on what it seems to be. From the picture that I've attached, do you think you can tell me what's wrong with the tree? Thanks in advance.
Ugh. I suppose it might even be frost cracking. Otherwise, identifying a particular pathogen might require lab work, in which case you could show photos for years and nobody looking at them could say what, exactly was causing it.
Don't what has caused it, but the bark there is dead for at least half the trunk's circumference, with extensive decay resulting. That makes it potentially dangerous. I'd remove the tree outright before it breaks in a storm, and plant a new tree in its place.
I second the suggestion to remove the tree. Silver Maples have weak wood and are considered inferior to many slections available today. You may want to consider a Red Maple/Silver Maple hybrid called "Autumn Fantasy". It has stronger wood like a red maple, but a fast growth rate like the silver. The fall colors are especially beautiful.
From the looks of this tree there isn't a whole lot to work with to try to rescue this tree. I suppose that with some major pruning out of all of the damaged limbs that we can start a new tree from what is left of the newer growth. If the tree meant that much to me then I'd cut out all of the pathogen infected, and insect harbored diseased wood and start over with a single vigorous new shoot from the base of the tree and let that new shoot in time become my "new" tree. Shallow bark canker does this to Silver Maple. I've seen Shallow bark canker come in soon after a pruning wound does not heal. The area of major concern with Silver Maple is that all the while we wait for the pruning wound to heal and in time compartmentalize, we have a wound that is quite susceptible to airborne bacterial and fungal pathogens. Aside from the fact that we already have some Verticillium alboatrum in the trees systems, we surely see problems develop over time when we these trees get "hit" by a more virulent invader such as Pseudomonas or Erwinia sp.. The insect issue comes about later after the infected wood starts to deteriorate. In other words, the borer, beetles and in some cases wood termite infestations are not seen until the outer wood of the trunk and/or large limbs have already been infected by a pathogen and the affected outer wood starts to break down and the outer bark and raised, separated from the inner, wood deteriorates. Jim
