Sunrise Landscape Designs

    Have you noticed any tan colored, irregular shaped blobs laying on top of your bark?  It is a fungus called Snow Mold and it is quite harmless in outdoor plant beds.  It will fade out by itself but if you don’t like to look at it, you can remove it and it probably won’t come back again this year.

    The weather man is predicting a warm, dry week so stay ahead on watering.  Early morning watering is the most effective but if you want to water in the heat of the day, use drip or direct watering instead of overhead with sprinklers.

    Have you pruned your late spring flowering shrubs yet?  Lilac, Weigela, and Spirea are just a few that should be trimmed this month.  These can be fast growing shrubs so be sure to remove enough foliage to keep them looking nice until next years flowers appear.

    The Hydrangea are showing beautiful blooms right this summer.  My ‘Annabelle’ Hydrangea are growing in full sun and starting to fade just a little but a later, taller variety is right behind them getting ready to take over the flower show.  I like to cut off the blossoms with long stems attached and dry them upside down in a cool, dark place.  In December, I lay them on the branches of my Christmas tree.  The long stems help to keep the dried blooms in place.

A good question came in this week I wanted to share with you along with my answer to try to solve their problem.

Q: We have a question about a tree that we transplanted from a farm to our front yard 2 summers ago (it is probably 15 feet tall). It is a maple tree that seemed to do fine last year. This year we had one of those plastic bases that contain mulch and then weeds won’t grow up in the mulch. I put quite a layer of bark mulch in the tray at the base of the maple tree and I don’t know if that contributed to it or not, but all of the leaves have shriveled up and it looks like it is pretty much dead. We thought that maybe the black plastic ring with mulch was too hot for the roots and might have caused it to die. We have underground sprinkling so it has been receiving water. Our other maple tree that we had transplanted seems to be doing fine. Do you have any ideas for what might have caused the leaves to brown and shrivel up and is there anything we can do to save it now?
Kimberly K., Byron Center, MI

A: I have never seen one of these mulch rings before so I’ll do my best to answer you. One big problem I see with some homeowners mulching their trees is they put huge piles of bark or grass clippings right against the trunk of the tree. This can cause the bark on the lower part of the tree to rot from being in a consistently moist environment. Once that bark is rotted, and the tree is “girdled,” the tree roots will not be able to send water up to the leaves. Pull off the mulch ring and examine the bark to see if it was resting directly against the tree trunk. I don’t believe the color of the black plastic ring was an issue but it is possible there was a chemical on the mulch that was harmful to the tree. (Was it made in China?)

We have also had some long, hot, dry weather that may have caused the tree to simply dry out. Maybe the stressed tree is in full sun and on a slope where the water would run off and the healthy tree is in a low area in the shade. Watering is a tricky thing. Underground sprinkling for lawns is not sufficient for watering trees. Trees need a lot more water than grass. If you think this might be a possibility, lay a hose on the top of the root ball and let the water trickle slowly into the root zone for an hour. Do this 2 times/week and see if the tree pushes new leaves.

Bark can be applied at any time now if you know where all of your plants are located. It is easier to put bark down before the perennials come up, however, you do not want to have the bark deep around the throat of the plants. You might want to go back later and pull some of the bark away from the plants if you can’t see where they will be coming up from yet. It is best to just feather the bark up to the trunk or stem of any plant to prevent rot.

I heard a talk last week on bark given by a professor from MSU. His favorite bark is Red Pine Bark. It costs a bit more but adds acidity to the soil which is usually needed to help lower the soil pH. Most plants grow best at 6.5-7.0 and our soils are usually around 8-8.5. If you need help applying bark to your landscape beds, give me a call!

Have you ever wondered about making good use of your Christmas tree after the holidays? Tom, a GGT reader, asked if he ground up his Christmas tree into mulch, would it make good mulch on his garden or around trees and plantings. I think that is a great idea!

As the mulch breaks down, it will add nutrients and help to lower the pH of the soil. It will work well around trees (esp. evergreens), Blueberries, Rhododendrons, Azalea, Hydrangea, Holly or any other plants that prefer a pH of less than 7. Another good use for discarded Christmas trees is to cut off branches and lay them on top of the perennials that are tenderer to over-winter. The tree boughs will help to insulate the ground.

We’ve all seen them and if you have them in your yard, I hope you will remedy the situation as soon as you read this! Bark volcanos are where a homeowner has piled bark around his tree in a tall, volcano shaped mound. It may seem like this would help the tree but it is really very harmful. The moisture that the shredded bark is holding in will eventually cause the tree bark to rot leading to a “girdling effect” around the base of the tree. The tree will die a slow death because you have cut off it’s water supply that lies just beneath the bark layer.

The proper way to bark around trees is to put a 4 ” layer of bark in a large circle around the base of the tree. The size of the circle will depend on the size of the tree. A large tree could have a bark circle as large as 12′ across. Don’t be afraid to go big as this is very helpful to the health of the tree. As the bark gets closer to the tree trunk, the depth of the bark should taper down to almost nothing touching the trunk. The trunk requires air circulation all the way down to the soil level.

Garden Chores: Put a fresh layer of bark in plant beds and around trees. The forsythia are blooming which is our que that the ground is warm enough to put crabicide down on the lawn.

It’s time to get your plant beds spruced up for the season and a fresh layer of shredded bark may be needed.

To know how much bark to order, there is a great formula to use. First, measure your plant beds. I know they probably aren’t easy to measure but get a close guess. Take the length x width to get the square footage. Then divide the sq. ft. by 81 and that number is the number of yards of bark you’ll need to cover an area with 4″ of bark. If you only need 2″ of bark, then divide the number by 2.

Example: I have a bed that is 8′ x 10′ so that is 80 square feet. 80 divided by 81 equals approx. 1 yard of bark to cover that bed with 4″ of bark.

Amount of bark needed for tree and shrub beds: 4″; for perennial beds: 2″; for annual beds: 1″ or none.

If just freshening up existing bark beds, be careful not to overdo it. Usually, half (or less) of the above amounts will work. Just dig in the plant bed to see how much is left from last year.