Styrax japonica bark has a vertical split My lovely Styrax japonica, 40 feet high, prolific bloomer, grows in partial shade on the Sunshine Coast zone 8 about 20 feet away from a large Cedar tree. I just noticed the back of the tree away from any sun & my sight, has a 4 foot vertical split in its bark starting from the base up. the opening is a couple of inches wide & it looks just like a healed scar on each side of the opening. There are no Styrax branches on the side by the cedar. The leaves are very green & the tree looks very healthy looking. just ferns under the tree, no weed wackers. I fear it wont survive this & if it comes down it will land on my hydro lines near the house. Our winter wasnt that bad, it has good drainage, I cant figure out what could have caused this 'injury or disease' & is there anything at this stage that I can do? I am a Master Gardener. Help please Sept 9 2013 I limbed the bottom branches. my sense is there is so much weight on one side of the tree away from the cedar boughs, which has caused the roots to be in severe stress from trying to hold the onesided branched weight. Is this a reasonable guess? can the tree be saved if the top is removed? or will the tree be very ugly & still unstable afterwards? Last edited by cedargrove; Today at 03:00 PM. Reason: added information height of tree 40' & possible reason.. pls help
