clemsonfor
Super Member
Has there been anyroot damage to the tree, trenching etc around it. Or has there been any activity around them that has been different in the past, root compaction, driving around it, even heavy foot trafic?
Could you grow a huge Live Oak tree by ...
- Thread starter beppington
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Has there been anyroot damage to the tree, trenching etc around it. Or has there been any activity around them that has been different in the past, root compaction, driving around it, even heavy foot trafic?
OP
beppington
Elite Member
None of that at all. These are in the middle of a very dense FL jungle (by my non-expert definition of a jungle) that I think is borderline wetlands. Maybe it's been too wet for them for a while, I dunno, but I know of no reason the area would be more wet now than over the past x 100's of years. Aside from maybe a few people tropping nearby through the wilderness while the lot was for sale, I don't think there have been any humans anywhere near them in a long, long time, if ever. It is really grown up & looks like virgin, never-touched forest to me.
Angelus
New member
I'm thinking the soil conditions are probably not the problem. "Dense jungle" probably means too much shade for the live oaks.
I have some very old live oaks on my 23 acre property in Louisiana. Near a bayou with 20 ft elevation change from waters edge to high point. My hundred year old live oaks thrive on the uplands and slopes. The few that exist in the lower areas are not nearly as well-developed.
In those lower areas, different oaks (water, willow, etc.) thrive and the live oaks drop large branches. This is probably because the taller oaks grow faster in the lowland conditions and shade out the live oaks, which have a lower, spreading growth habit.
My advice is to remove the competing trees in the "jungle." Within a year you should see a lot of new growth on the live oaks. They will start spreading. And since their roots are already covered by forest humus, fertilization should not be necessary.
MarkV
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I was wondering if the larger trees on your property are also in a "very dense FL jungle that is borderline wetlands"? Many of the oaks in wetland situations are Water Oaks rather than Live Oaks.
MarkV
MarkV
clemsonfor
Super Member
i was thinking the same thing, too much water will drown many tree species with the exeption of cypress and tupelo gum, maple and a few others found in bays and swamps. Has there been a fire? Prolly not but that will kill trees as these unburned areas where fire has been secluded for years, turn to "jungles" and that leaf litter piles up and forms nutrient rich much, which the feeder roots move and grow into , a fire then burns this litter layer down to moisture or bare mineral soil, causing death to the feeder roots and cutting of most of the trees way to uptake nutrients or moisture. I do not think this is your problem as you would have probly said could fire have killed and oak or somethink like that. If i were there i could probably give you an idea but not being able to see whats going on its hard. Water standing in the wrong time of the year to long will definitly kill one though. It dosent matter if its 140 years old swaps are getting filled in all over the place and wetlands ditched and drained other places, causing remaining wetlands to maybe be wetter at any given point in time than they would have been under the same circumstances 100 years ago.
Pollution? Salt spray/Incrusion?
Pollution? Salt spray/Incrusion?
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