Calling all the armchair arborists

[workinonit]

I see your point and I am sorry your trees have caused you so much grief and heartache.

I enjoyed the trees up until I didn't. Most of the oaks around here are just old water oaks which is what most of these were. There were some white oaks sprinkled in. I just think I was short sighted by not removing the ones that needed to be when I had the chance to cut them down. Heck, I have 38 Live Oak trees that I planted down both sides of my 1/4 mile driveway. Planted them when they were 6' tall and an inch in diameter. They are starting to canopy across my drive now. Most of them are 12" in diameter and probably 40' tall.
I'm not sure about there but here if there's a big oak in endangering your house the insurance companies can refuse coverage if they do a drone inspection. But we are in the hurricane corridor here in SC.

 

[rScotty]

Nice trees. I wish we had some big hardwoods here. In the Rocky Mountains we have some scrub oak - called burr oak. And I've planted one big oak from the tree farm and it is doing well..

Anyway, about the soil covering over the roots. I know nothing about your climate. Here, we are mostly pine, fir, and aspen. All of them are real picky about the soil over their roots. It's not that they want it to be dry or wet or any particular covering, but they don't like for it to change - and particularly they don't like for it to get any deeper right over their roots. It's when soil - even sand - builds up higher over their roots that they don't do well. One old gardener thinks that they are picky about how much air gets through the soil right over their roots.

He might have a point. I have noticed that healthy trees seem to do something to inhibit the growth of anything right over their own root ball. Maybe they create some sort of natural herbicide.

I'd at least give it some space. Not put crusher right up to the base of the tree. I try to give ours about six feet of natural space all around the base of the tree. Oaks might need more... but I bet you can tell by looking.
rScotty

Here's a belt buckle I welded up from a photo of a windswept live Oak on the Calif. coast.
rScotty

 

[jyoutz]

Nice trees. I wish we had some big hardwoods here. In the Rocky Mountains we have some scrub oak - called burr oak. And I've planted one big oak from the tree farm and it is doing well..

Anyway, about the soil covering over the roots. I know nothing about your climate. Here, we are mostly pine, fir, and aspen. All of them are real picky about the soil over their roots. It's not that they want it to be dry or wet or any particular covering, but they don't like for it to change - and particularly they don't like for it to get any deeper right over their roots. It's when soil - even sand - builds up higher over their roots that they don't do well. One old gardener thinks that they are picky about how much air gets through the soil right over their roots.

He might have a point. I have noticed that healthy trees seem to do something to inhibit the growth of anything right over their own root ball. Maybe they create some sort of natural herbicide.

I'd at least give it some space. Not put crusher right up to the base of the tree. I try to give ours about six feet of natural space all around the base of the tree. Oaks might need more... but I bet you can tell by looking.
rScotty

Here's a belt buckle I welded up from a photo of a windswept live Oak on the Calif. coast.View attachment 867976
rScotty

The critical natural space needed around the tree stem is the drip line (from crown edge to crown edge).