Worked in the yard this weekend…finished up pruning and general clean up. Found a few trees (Plum, apricot and aprium) with crack bark on the trunk…when I peeled it back they looked like this. Weird that 4 trees had this same thing happen…could it be from sunscald? None were injured that I know of…no marks.
Have you ever seen this?
What side of the tree was this on? Was it the same for all trees. One would expect sunscald to be on the outside, but I’m not an expert. We don’t have to worry about sunscald here in Georgia.
They are all on the sun side…make since that sun scald would be the reason behind it.
I have began to paint all my trees. Stupid mistake I made not painting them from the beginning.
Can I paint over the split? or do I block the sun somehow from the trunks? or…is this going to be death to the tree?
I can’t be 100% certain, but it looks to me like the tree is starting to fill in that injury… that liver tree material that kind of looks like it is flowing into the wound from the edges, the same way a tree fills in over a pruning cut. If so, then that is an old injury that the tree is responding to on its own. Maybe it was sunscald damage from a year or few ago, and the bark just peeled off this year? If I’m right, then you might want to protect that new live tissue from sun damage, or just leave well enough alone. Looks like it might take another 5 years or so for the tree to completely fill in the dead area. But even if it didn’t, the tree can grow fine by moving nutrients and water through the 80% of the trunk that isn’t damaged.
I had same thing happen on a big old tree I am topworking. It was sun damage. So I painted all my trunks up to first branch with interior white latex plus drywall joint compound plus a little water. May have to repaint every other year or so.
Not death … it will be fine. I paint all my deciduous trees on the south side of the trunk, each year right after leaf fall. There’s no need to paint the northern side, unless you’re mixing in other things like fungicide. I’ll also paint the large scaffolds that I’d care not to lose. I also paint all bareroot trees immediately after they go in the ground. Paint over the split. I try to fill in any cracks and cover large pruning wounds with paint. Sunscald should only be an issue when you get intense sunlight in winter, which unfortunately happens in Southern California most every year. On younger trees I typically have a drainage pipe rodent guard, which provides additional protection.
Yes, as said above, most probably this is sunscald. I white paint all tree trunks and main branches. Just cover everything with white latex paint (mixed with some water), trees will likely survive.
Question: Do you mix the paint with water just to make it go farther? Or could using straight paint damage the tree? Addendum: I just read that full strength paint helps deter borers. Paint plus joint compound deters borers even more.
Yes I mix with water, probably about 1:1 and sometimes I throw in a bit of old joint compound. I’ve never used straight paint. Also I use a latex based paint.
Puggylover75 hi
I think my pear tree have same kind of bark as your tree as you asked for it. About your plum tree, you mentioned few trees but no mention what tree is in image but let’s say plum how old is this tree ? Is it something like 10 years old? I am not expert on this as i don’t have much experience growing fruit trees that way i could have big harvest of fruits , so this is just something which came in mind using common sense. I think young trees have smooth surface trunk/branches, when they get older trunk gets bigger in size and becomes suberisation. In your image i see your tree has that kind of trunk, that suggest your tree is older tree. Is it possible this suberisation bark is more prone to cracking than smoother bark? I guess it is possible that this kind of bark can crack more easily.
You got some answer your question, they seems to saying it is sunscald looks like you was right way on your thought on your message. There was suggestion to paint trunk, white is color which reflect sunlight so using common sense it might help if you think sunscald is cause for this. It might be also that naturally when tree becomes older it gets that kind of bark which is more prone to crack, it might be part natural life of that tree. You wrote what you can for this trunk split altough you used little different words in subject of your message, i think there is not much to do about it. Some suggested painting of trunk in those messages. If i look your image, it seems bark is not damaged so much as it possible your tree is alive. If you compare that bark part to that old part of bark which has not removed above it looks like in image that damage didn’t went much inside toward of center part of trunk. As you asked is your tree going to dead, i think not. It seems center part of trunk where minerals, vitamins, water and sugars or something like that moves are O.K. and probably is functional/not damaged as of this. I think question what you do now, answer might be don’t do anything. Another might be that painting trunk. White painting for trunk for sunscald as have been wrote to you earlier message. If you think that would help you can put net around you tree if you think rabbit or some animal can bite your tree as you talked about injury, but in my opinion rabbit or deer prefer younger trees more than older trees. It looks like your tree could be O.K. i think, you can see it in spring when it is time your tree to wake up where you are, don’t do where you are living. This is just something which came in mind using common sense, maybe someone can give your more detailed information. i don’t have much experience on this but maybe this gave you something information about this.
