Disaster Strikes my Sycamore Tree

We have a beautiful sycamore planted by a previous owner of our place.
Its probably about 15yrs old. We lost the top during a recent storm - probably
10'. There's no leader now. Can we get on the branches to take over or
must we cut it down?

Tam

You don't need to cut it down, but you also might not have a leader. Make a clean cut at the break and wait it out. A new leader might sucker from below the cut, or perhaps several of them will form (which then should be thinned to one). Or the upper lateral branches might become the plagiotropic scaffold of a picturesque spreading tree with no central stem. Fifty years from now you might have the most interesting sycamore in town, as long as you keep it from developing narrowly parallel leaders.

Guy S.

I've seen them pruned by powerline guys so that it is a tree with a large hole in the centre with a wire. The outside branches do a good job of growing and with a leader. You might want to gently train the highest branch a bit upright with a stake to get it going.

Tammy, if it's a valuable tree, if I were you I'd call an arborist to take a look at it. I'd be concerned that there may be some kind of insect or disease damage that caused the tree to break in the storm or that could result from the storm damage. They would also be able to do the proper pruning to create a new leader.

I know it's expensive but it might be cheaper than replacing a 15-year-old tree.

There was a huge, maybe 50 foot pine tree on the property behind us that lost its top in a storm a few years ago. Within a year it was dead. I would suspect either it already had a problem, which is why it had storm damage when other large pines near it had none, or the storm damage created an environment that gave insects or disease an opportunity.

Hart, it sounds like your pine might have taken a lightning strike. Merely having some top breakage shouldn't kill a tree that fast. Many old pines and other conifers live on for centuries after losing their tops. But I agree about calling a (certified) arborist if Tammy has any doubts about how to handle this, even if the tree is only 15 years old.
Guy S.

Thanks for the advice. I've had a terrible time getting any arborists out to my place
this summer. We lost a birch 2 yrs ago and it desparately needed to come down.
Well - another summer storm took care of that partially. My DH climbed up 20', cut
a 10' section partway, tied it to the tractor & pulled it down. Went back up, cut another
section and so on til he got it down.

The sycamore is very large. We think it had a double leader already. The break
on the top was right above a black section where a "branch" had blown off in an
earlier storm. Probably a weak crotch - lost the first "branch" and then a week
later the true leader.

Its too tall for us to climb ... I'll start pleading with the arbortist to come out soon. I'm
encouraged that it might regain a pleasing form in time.

We're having terrible luck with trees on this farm.
Tam

Amen! I'm so glad he started before I left for the day! When I saw him up there sawing on the
tree, which had been dead for 2 yrs and was swaying with his motion, I changed my plans
and stayed home by the phone poised to call 911. Thankfully he survived it! Here's a picture
after he took the first section down and was getting ready to cut the second.

Tam

This message was edited Jul 30, 2006 6:08 PM

Far be it from me to bear bad tidings, but......I think you've got a decapitated birch there, not a sycamore.

As dead as that tree looks, and being a birch too, that ranks a big 10+ on the dumbness meter! I thought people in PA were smarter than that.

Assuming he keeps doing such things, take out a whoppin' big life insurance policy on him, and make sure it covers "accidental death by stupidity" or something like that. And if the fall just leaves him quadriplegic, be ready to put the ol' pillow over his face to finish the job. (Then hide the pillow and tell the paramedics he musta knocked the wind outa hisself when he fell.)

Then just wait -- you can retire in luxury as soon as he runs out of dumb luck.

Guy S.

sorry - crossed stories. The birch was an illustration in how difficult it has been to get
an arborist here. I called three or four in April/May and my DH risked life and limb (tee hee)
to take it down after a storm got a big chunk down first.

Tam

I may just pull up your comment for him to see for himself. I just don't carry
much weight around here with my warnings. He thinks I worry too much.
Tam

Yeah, I like that one too! But maybe past tense: "He thought I worried too much!"

At least tell DH that if he wants to do such stuff he needs to take some safety training via his state's chapter of ISA. And if he doesn't know what ISA is, he has no business up a tree.

Guy S.

OK - this is too weird. Guys ganging up on guys. (or guy. Not Guy.)

I'll have to get the arborist out here before he heads up the sycamore.
Tam

We just want you to preserve his income, so that you can spend the money on plants (like we do with our wives earnings).

We'd say the same about carelessness/clumsiness in the fairer gender (are you listening, EQ?).

I for one am proud of him for showing his macho self directed side. I think he could have easily cut the tree from the ground but I bet you were proud of him for going up the tree to attack the Dinosaur. These are what we men need to more of! Take chances and get more life insurance. LOL

You guys are nuts!

OK - here's the deal. He has life insurance but its going to his brother, not me.

I would have thought the time he set up the ladder on the deck to clean the gutters would have
taught him a lesson. He didn't tell me what he was doing so I didn't hear his yelling when the
ladder slipped out from under him. I was mowing the grass far from the house when the neighbor
got me ... saying "now he's OK". DH bounced his ribs on the edge of the deck - I'm sure they
were broken. But of course, eh hem, he didn't see a doctor.

Good thing I've got my own income to cover necessities - new trees and such.

I'll have to read up on Equil's antics. I guess I missed her examples of machismo in the "fairer" sex.

Tam

Edited to say - OK. I see that comment about "we'd say the same about carelessness/clumsiness in
fairer gender (are you listening, EQ?)." was not about machismo on EQ's part! Go pink-booted
X-Team!

This message was edited Jul 30, 2006 8:57 PM

Guy, that pine wasn't struck by lightning. I had another tree, not a pine, struck by lightning a few years ago and it was dead in days, not months.

I'm sure pines can live after losing their tops, but we lost another very large pine on our property after the idiots the electric company hired to trim went at it and chopped the top to pieces. It also died within about an year and I'm sure either insects or disease came in after the so-called pruning.

And I know what ISA is.

They can die from lightning in days, months, years, or milliseconds. Down in your region maybe there were pine bark beetles and such involved too.

The ISA reference was intended for Tammy to take to her daredevil husband! I was following up on your original advice to her.

Guy S.

The tree wasn't struck by lightning. I was here the day the top went down. There was no lightning just very heavy winds. And I was just fooling with you about ISA but I really do know what it is. My guy is a tree guy. One of his coworkers was very seriously injured falling out of a 60 foot tree recently because he wasn't using a steel core safety rope. I don't think tree climbing is something grown men should do unless they know what they're doing.

One of my favorite epitaphs was:

"See! I told you I was sick

I'm working up a presentation on "The Dark Side of Botany" right now for the Chicago Botanic Garden (about the botany and botanical symbolism of Victorian cemeteries). Maybe I could use some of these epitaphs, along with the "Keep on Composting" one from yesterday. I would need to credit all the forum folks at Dave's Garden!

Guy S.

Sounds fun...er um.. interesting! LOL

Quoted: "Hear that, Tammy? Of course, it's easy for me to agree because I'm afraid of heights anyway!
Guy S."

Gosh, Guy, How to you get out of bed it the morning. You are nearly 2 stories tall yourself...

Two METERS, not two stories!

By the way, that coffin pic was taken during one of my research trips last winter. I refuse to identify the cute young models, to protect the guilty . . .

Guy S.

Nuts. You are all definitely nuts. I guess that's why ya'll enjoy trees so much. ;-)

I know who that is, why that's the secret tree fondler. I love it!

Who's the tree fondler -- Tammy?

I didn't think anyone was looking!

Here's the top of my poor sycamore

A picture of most of the tree.

It might send up a sprout that can become a new leader -- wait and see. The biggie is to thin out any such sprouts so there is only one left. And if it doesn't sprout, you'll have a nice big slingshot tree in a decade or so.

Guy S.

Yeah ... I'd have a real weapon of mass destruction if I set it up as as giant slingshot.
Maybe could pick off those hoofed roving rats trying to much on my landscape...
this could work!

Tam

From your first sycamore picture: consider strapping together the first branches to the right and to the left (below the new cut) and pulling them together towards an upright position. Left that way for about a year (and onset of new growth) you may resurrect a leader with some stout character instead of trying to nurse along a sprout from a latent bud at the point of decay. The branch to the left seems to have the most chance at success.

Have your DH perform this task, once you have verified ample life insurance policy (double indemnity). He could enlist the local SWAT or First Responders, and do the work dangling from a helicopter so he can't fall from a ladder or poorly attached branch.

I never heard of strapping two branches together. Might they merge together? Is that the idea?

I called the arborist to ask him to try to get our here soon (explained the issue). I have not heard
back from him. I may just get an insurance policy issued on DH and get him moving on this
project.

Thanks
Tam

"Strapping together" intent is to use one branch as a stake for the other, instead of trying to insert and tie off a stake to the trunk that high up in the tree. This is done often to re-establish leaders in conifers, etc., instead of waiting to see if the plant will cooperate on its own. Just a method of speeding up the process.

Once the branch has grown a while in the direction you've strapped it, it will have formed new wood supporting that growth habit and then you take off the strap (so you don't girdle the branch/trunk). Use wide material that won't cut into the bark of the tree.

OK - I see. You need to make sure one is taller/higher than the other, right?
I just hope the arborist gets back to us soon...
Tam