Heal scar or feauture Arakawa

[Matte91]

Hello.

My arakawa have a big scar. Last summer I exposed the cambium layer and sealed it. I checked today and it hasn't started healing yet. I think I did a poor job last year.
The wood was a little rotten, I removed the rotten wood and treated with Lime sulphur.

Now my question is would you fill out the scar with milliput, expose the cambium layer again and seal it. Or keep the big scar as a feature?

Thank you in advance!

 

[Brian Van Fleet]

I would heal it. Lime Sulfur isn’t much of a preservative, so if you did get rid of the rotting wood, clean the edge well to expose the cambium and use a cut paste to seal up the whole wound.

 

[Matte91]

I would heal it. Lime Sulfur isn’t much of a preservative, so if you did get rid of the rotting wood, clean the edge well to expose the cambium and use a cut paste to seal up the whole wound.

Lime sulfur was recommended by one of the users. I dont know if it works or not.
I removed all the rotting wood to the fresh wood. There are only a few tiny black spots yet. Is that fine or should I remove more?

 

[Shibui]

I have found that lime sulfur does slow decay markedly and I use it on most larger maple scars if I want them to heal over.
1 year to heal a large scar is a bit optimistic. It may be Ok if the tree is young and growing vigorously but I suspect you keep this one well trimmed. That slows growth and therefore bark growth over scars. 2 things to heal scars on trees- 1 - growth above the scar; 2 - time.
I suspect you'll be looking at 3-6 years for that scar to grow over.

 

[GGB]

I like to feature scars if it’s an option, but i’d heal that one over

 

[Matte91]

I have found that lime sulfur does slow decay markedly and I use it on most larger maple scars if I want them to heal over.
1 year to heal a large scar is a bit optimistic. It may be Ok if the tree is young and growing vigorously but I suspect you keep this one well trimmed. That slows growth and therefore bark growth over scars. 2 things to heal scars on trees- 1 - growth above the scar; 2 - time.
I suspect you'll be looking at 3-6 years for that scar to grow over.

Thanks for your answer.
I know that the scar cant heal in one season. What I dont understand is why it hasnt started rolling over yet. But as I mentioned in my first post, I probably did a poor job when I exposed the cambium layer.

 

[Jester217300]

The wound is likely not closing because there is no structure for the callus to roll over. If you want this to heal (I would), you need to fill the concave void with epoxy (as you suggested) so the would is at lease flush, or possible slightly convex. Then you can wound the cambium if you want for healing.

 

[Matte91]

Can anyone tell me if I manage to heal the scar. Will the healed scar get flaky bark as the rest of the tree in the future?

 

[leatherback]

What I dont understand is why it hasnt started rolling over yet

How much did you let the branches grow? You really need to give the tree space to develop for wounds to start closing. Effectively, you need the trunk to really thicken a bit. (And of course, the wood needs to be solid, but that you said, it was.)

 

[Brian Van Fleet]

Can anyone tell me if I manage to heal the scar. Will the healed scar get flaky bark as the rest of the tree in the future?

Yes it will

 

[Matte91]

So before I expose the cambium and seal with paste. I just want to know if I filled the scar with epoxy correct or not?

 

[Davidlpf]

Can anyone tell me if I manage to heal the scar. Will the healed scar get flaky bark as the rest of the tree in the future?

This is an example of one of @MACH5 Arakawas, so it seems it will.

 

[Matte91]

This is an example of one of @MACH5 Arakawas, so it seems it will.

Thank you. Do you have a link to the thread? Perhaps he has documented how he managed to heal that scar.

 

[MACH5]

Thank you. Do you have a link to the thread? Perhaps he has documented how he managed to heal that scar.

I can't take credit for the closing wound on the arakawa. The tree did that all by itself. I just watched from the sidelines In any case here is the thread link https://www.bonsainut.com/threads/arakawa-japanese-maple.11825/

However you might be interested in this thread.

CLOSING WOUNDS

Today I worked on closing a large wound on a kifu size trident maple that I have posted here before. I wanted to tackle this earlier last year but did not get to it so I decided to get ahead and do it now before spring is upon us. I suspect it was a big cut made to create the taper and the...

www.bonsainut.com

 

[Davidlpf]

Thank you. Do you have a link to the thread? Perhaps he has documented how he managed to heal that scar.

I'll tell you a secret, there are a thing called search in the upper right corner.....It can be magic!





Anyway, here you have the link

Arakawa Japanese Maple​

Cheers!

 

[SouthernMaple]

Hello.

My arakawa have a big scar. Last summer I exposed the cambium layer and sealed it. I checked today and it hasn't started healing yet. I think I did a poor job last year.
The wood was a little rotten, I removed the rotten wood and treated with Lime sulphur.

Now my question is would you fill out the scar with milliput, expose the cambium layer again and seal it. Or keep the big scar as a feature?

Thank you in advance!

not a fan of the big hole, however I do like the other one. If this were my tree I would ground layer above the big hole and pray for roots. By the time that big hole heals you will have decent roots on the new layer

 

[Davidlpf]

Maples can close holes, it is only a mater of time AND LET THE PLANT GROW. The more it grow, the fasther the healing.

My shishigashira grafted in standar scion it is on the way.

Arakawa can do the same, and replace the bark, so I wouldn't worry at all!.

IMHO roug bark trees, close better than smoth ones.

You can see this ulmus minor that I planted in the ground in only one season had go fron this

To this

Cheers.

 

[Cadillactaste]

Lime sulfur was recommended by one of the users. I dont know if it works or not.
I removed all the rotting wood to the fresh wood. There are only a few tiny black spots yet. Is that fine or should I remove more?

In the UK they don't use lime sulfer on deciduous. Deadwood they use a wood hardener. And they do Deadwood over there...on deciduous. Do you like the scar? That's what I would go off of. It's your bench...your tree.

 

[Davidlpf]

Uk is a quite big country, and there the maples roll over the holes as well.

Take a look to this one Peter Chan maple that I posted in another thread click,click. That was a big wound closed over the years.

If is heathy the tree will try to grow over the wound, it is said that "nature abhors a vacuum". Another thing is that you like holes and want to get it opened, (We are talking about trees, please don't misunderstand ) but I think that is not the Matte91's case, because he is trying to close it.


Cheers.

 

[Cadillactaste]

Double post sorry.