hi all hope everyone had a good winter and are ready for spring. our sango kaku has had some winter damage,there appears to be some black branches and some gray ones also,both seem dead.i know that where we live in the u.s.north east that winter winds can harm them and this appears to be the case here. the tree is just starting to leaf out. can anyone give us info on when to prune the tree and how? this is the first year that the tree is planted and its about 7 foot tall so its not real young we posted pics of it last fall here. we will post some pics of the tree soon so you can see the damage,any info would be appreciated thanks
I'd cut it back right now. Snip all the dead branches back to just above the last healthy, opening buds. A friend of mine here in Maine has had one of these for many years, and this annual spring trimming of winter die-back is part of the routine. I hope your spring in Massachusetts in moving a little faster than ours. We haven't had a hard frost for a couple of weeks, but neither have we had any really warm (i.e. over 50 degrees) weather. It's 36F outside as I type.
thanks for the advise. here are several pics of the tree. we have heard that we should wait till the tree leafs out before doing any major cutting in the spring.any advise about this?
Myles, I think the waiting applies to small twig dieback. What I see in the pictures is more major, I would certainly not wait: cut to clean wood. And sterilize the secateurs after each cut. Good luck! -E
spring pics of sango kaku after winter cut back thanks for the info on when to cut back our tree. its starting to leaf out now, we cut back all the black dead branches. here are some new pics,we hope it continues to get bigger,next year we are going to try an antidessacant spray that is supposed to help protect it.
Myles hi, I nip mine off each year to a red point on the twig. I had quite a lot last year but little now as I can see. Do we feed these trees because mine does'nt seem to be growing taller? I never fed it in six years. And also this year the tree stayed red, no leaves. Further down the main trunk is dark brown, but so are some branches, do I remove these brown ones? Thanks
hi , we usualy give the tree a little food in spring time, we use a very mild ferterlizer, we use espoma plant tone,its organic and seems to be ok. as you saw in the picture of our tree it had quite a bit of black braches due to winter ,it was the trees first year in the ground,we cut it back in april,and it grew well,this past winter we have no black branches,i used an anti dessacant spray on it and it seems to have worked out great.will post some new pics of it soon
Thanks for your message Myles, Can you also rec a bug clear to use, mine do get very tiny holes in the leaves.
hi we do not spray our tree with anything for bugs,altho we do use seven for other trees,and in our garden. so far we have been lucky with this tree,we do sometimes get gypsy moth and other catapillers but recently we have not had this problem. this past winter we did see a lot of winter moths so we will watch closely this spring. here are several winter pics of this tree
Looks a bit like mine did some weeks back Myles lol I think they look just as beautiful white as red..hahahaha I have buds but no leaf yet. Its about four to five years old. I am going to feed it this week. It also needs a prune but I dare not in case I mess up. Problem is one side gets hardly any leaf on the bottom. I believe Acers are guilty of this.
