The Arborist Journal

With Christmas right around the corner, now is the time to ensure your trees and shrubs are prepared for the added stress the holidays will bring to them. For example, if you plan on hanging lights on your trees, leaving them there is not a good idea. Remember to remove them because if you have a healthy tree that is growing it possibly can choke and kill it. Also, installation of these lights should be done by professionals, safety devices such as ropes and saddles should be used to protect the client from liability and injury to the tree.

Fertilization and systemics should be soil injected to prepare your trees for the coming growing season.

Pine, Spruce and fir are not the only trees you can use for Christmas decoration. Understanding these trees are not expected to thrive here and for many reasons. Here in north Texas our native cedar is a great candidate. If you were to pull it out of the ground, (root ball), yourself it would be the only evergreen tree that you can actually plant and expect to live for the distant future. These trees are excellent in a landscape as a screen.

Are your trees looking different? Leaves turning color, falling off, this may be a serious problem and a Arborist would be the person that can answer your questions. If  you are experiencing premature leaf drop it may be indications of other stresses.

Health and vigor can defend against stress, disease, insect infestation and even in some cases damaging cultural practices. The goal is to use the most effective products available and educate the public on the after care. The way to achieve this is by using the new technology that is available to us. Systemics and organic products that are cost effective, efficient, and have low impact on the environment. A customized plan for your property is required since everyone has special concerns and different situations. Current programs offer a wide range of tree care that require many sprays, fertilizations and charges that are now deemed unnecessary and outdated. Many pests have aquired a resistance to spray products to point where they have little affect.  With the new techniques and chemistry all these needs can be incorporated into one treatment, a treatment that will cover the entire growing season, killing damaging insects while at the same time upgrading health.

The benefits are massive when soil injection treatment is compared to a spray/fert. program.

SPRAY/FERT. PROGRAM                          SOIL INJECTION TREATMENT

  multiple foliar sprays                                  one time treatment

  multiple fertilizations                                  one time treatment

  limited residual                                         growing season

  non-target species affected                      no effect

  multiple charges                                       initial cost aerification

Plant Health Care will give you the biggest bang for your buck(soil injection ).  An Arborist can afford  you to not only discuss the benefits in detail of soil injection but explain the challanges of  irrigating,  pruning,  and other needs required to best plan for their future.

 As Arborist, we always come into contact with trees on a property that are  out of their range. We  call these special needs trees,and should be addressed for the simple fact homeowners expectations may not be reasonable. Desire for such plantings has increased over the years and this is alright if they understand the challanges it requires to care for such specimens. This will be discussed at a later time.