JBP Needles drying out? Concerned.

[junmilo]

Hi All,

It has been a cold and dry winter. I kept some of my JBP, JWP, and the newly acquired Japanese Cork Bark in my garage to over winter.

During the initial winter period, everything is normal...

Just last few weeks. I have noticed few branches or entire tree's needles are in a very light color.

I understand that during winter, the tree is dormant and don't need do to photosynthesis...etc...(Let me know if this is wrong).

SO I GOT REALLY WORRIED...I started to lift trees out of their pot to see if the roots were rotting or healthy...well to my relief...the roots are all nice and fresh and growing...

Any Ideas? The Needles are Crispy...when i break them..i still see the normal green in them..but it seems the outer shell (cells) are drying out...I water them once a month...

Thanks

 

[Vance Wood]

Hi All,

It has been a cold and dry winter. I kept some of my JBP, JWP, and the newly acquired Japanese Cork Bark in my garage to over winter.

During the initial winter period, everything is normal...

Just last few weeks. I have noticed few branches or entire tree's needles are in a very light color.

I understand that during winter, the tree is dormant and don't need do to photosynthesis...etc...(Let me know if this is wrong).

SO I GOT REALLY WORRIED...I started to lift trees out of their pot to see if the roots were rotting or healthy...well to my relief...the roots are all nice and fresh and growing...

Any Ideas? The Needles are Crispy...when i break them..i still see the normal green in them..but it seems the outer shell (cells) are drying out...I water them once a month...

Thanks

Please fill out your profile we have no idea where you live (City and State is all) I am afraid you may not have watered them enough depending on the weather. That is the problem with keeping them in a shed they still need to be watered and depending on conditions once a month may not have been enough. I am however afraid you have described dead trees.

 

[junmilo]

I live in Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Thanks

Jun.

 

[junmilo]

Please fill out your profile we have no idea where you live (City and State is all) I am afraid you may not have watered them enough depending on the weather. That is the problem with keeping them in a shed they still need to be watered and depending on conditions once a month may not have been enough. I am however afraid you have described dead trees.

How is the tree dead if the roots are healthy and growing? and the candles are growing as well?

 

[Vance Wood]

How is the tree dead if the roots are healthy and growing? and the candles are growing as well?

Sorry, I do not recall you mentioning anything about candles, that changes everything. As cold as it has been I am surprised you have candles. I have not seen my trees in months they are buried under snow, another three inches were added last night.You may have needle cast, but usually crispy needles mean dead trees. We shall see. As things stand now we will know in about six weeks. Either way the quickest way to kill them is to fool around with them.

 

[Jason_mazzy]

As long as you have healthy roots growing you should be fine. Just be sure the tree never dried out completely.

 

[junmilo]

Sorry, I do not recall you mentioning anything about candles, that changes everything. As cold as it has been I am surprised you have candles. I have not seen my trees in months they are buried under snow, another three inches were added last night.You may have needle cast, but usually crispy needles mean dead trees. We shall see. As things stand now we will know in about six weeks. Either way the quickest way to kill them is to fool around with them.

Hi,

Sorry I forgot to mention the candles. Some of my trees are in the garage so i can see them. Most of them still have candles and some are getting longer and larger. But the rest of the tree's needle seems to turning into a light yellow..dunno what's going on..

 

[Adair M]

Pictures would help!

It depends on which needles.

3 year old needles would be turning yellow and fall off.

If they were 2013 needles, well, you have a problem.

 

[Dav4]

Also, if you have pines in a dark garage and their candles are extending, 1) the garage is too warm to maintain dormancy, and 2) They need as much sunlight as you can give them...outside. Sine they're growing, they are also no longer winter hardy, so any frozen soil is potentially dangerous (the extending candles can still handle a light frost).

 

[Vance Wood]

I feel that if the garage has been so warm as to allow the tree/trees to push candles it has been too warm to only water the tree/trees once a month. I suspect that the tree/trees could be among the lost due to lack of water. This is my main concern against using sheds and garages for winter storage, with the beginner still learning about watering and the such.

 

[Paradox]

I am quite a bit south of you. I also keep my trees in a garage all winter. I monitor the temperature with a min/max thermometer. When it gets a bit warm (about 40 deg F), I open the door to the garage for a few hours to cool it off.
None of my pines are pushing candles yet. Pictures would be a big help here.

 

[GrimLore]

Without pictures I can only guess they died from lack of dormancy and water as was posted previously. Yet another good reason to spend a few years understanding and knowing specimens before tossing out big dollars. It is also likely that none of this is documented by the owner which is a pain but most useful...

Grimmy

 

[Vance Wood]

Without pictures I can only guess they died from lack of dormancy and water as was posted previously. Yet another good reason to spend a few years understanding and knowing specimens before tossing out big dollars. It is also likely that none of this is documented by the owner which is a pain but most useful...

Grimmy

That seems to happen a lot; people come here for advice, they get told things don't look too good, the negative prognostications prove to be correct and the OP goes away. We seem to never know what happened which probably means we only got to witness the death of these trees earlier rather than latter. It would be nice to be wrong but there ya' go. It's too bad, but sometimes you can learn just about as much from a failure and a success.

 

[Paradox]

I forgot to include that I check my trees at least once a week. Most need water every 2 weeks but as it starts getting warmer, some may need water every week.

 

[Dav4]

For the 11 years I stored some trees in an unattached garage, I never had to water my trees more then once from Thanksgiving until the end of March or even April...ever. The trick was to keep them frozen and apply snow to the soil surface when available. It really was that simple. I overwintered everything from tridents to collected junipers this way...

 

[Paradox]

For the 11 years I stored some trees in an unattached garage, I never had to water my trees more then once from Thanksgiving until the end of March or even April...ever. The trick was to keep them frozen and apply snow to the soil surface when available. It really was that simple. I overwintered everything from tridents to collected junipers this way...

Depends on where you live.
That might have worked in Mass, where you get snow pretty reliably every winter and for most of the winter. Where I live, we often dont have to the luxury (depending on your point of view) of having snow available all the time every winter. They wont stay frozen in my garage (or outside some years) and most winters there isnt enough snow to put on them most of the time and some winters not at all. This is the first winter in a very long time that we have actually had snow on the ground for more than a few days at a time. Putting snow on them would be more work than just carrying a bucket of water out there once every 2 weeks and pouring a cup on each of them.

 

[Vance Wood]

For the 11 years I stored some trees in an unattached garage, I never had to water my trees more then once from Thanksgiving until the end of March or even April...ever. The trick was to keep them frozen and apply snow to the soil surface when available. It really was that simple. I overwintered everything from tridents to collected junipers this way...

You spoke well; keep them frozen and apply snow to the soil. I also bet you did not encounter buds starting to elongate either. This garage was allowed to get too warm and the trees started to move and were not watered.

 

[Dav4]

Depends on where you live.
That might have worked in Mass, where you get snow pretty reliably every winter and for most of the winter. Where I live, we often dont have to the luxury (depending on your point of view) of having snow available all the time every winter. They wont stay frozen in my garage (or outside some years) and most winters there isnt enough snow to put on them most of the time and some winters not at all. This is the first winter in a very long time that we have actually had snow on the ground for more than a few days at a time. Putting snow on them would be more work than just carrying a bucket of water out there once every 2 weeks and pouring a cup on each of them.

Actually, in eastern MA, we could get 100 inches of snow one winter, and maybe 6 inches of slush the next. I would never have considered my annual snow fall reliable by a long shot. There were winters where I might struggle to able to apply a few snow balls worth of snow to each pot all winter long. What was reliable, or at least it was a decade ago, was winter cold. I knew my trees would be frozen solid inside the garage by the end of December and they would stay that way through March, with me working hard to keep them cold by opening doors to ventilate starting in February. Honestly, based on the description you gave for your typical winter, I actually wonder why you keep them inside at all. For the record, my garage was large enough to store only 50% of my trees. The rest were outside.

 

[Vance Wood]

It is precisely the inconsistent nature of winters around here that I no longer use a shed for winter storage, I have found it to be unnecessary for the last ten years or so. However with the way our winter has been this year I may have to eat my words as well as a lot of my trees. I cannot remember a winter this severe and I have lived here nearly fifty years.

I have not seen most of them since before Thanks Giving in November.

 

[Dav4]

It is precisely the inconsistent nature of winters around here that I no longer use a shed for winter storage, I have found it to be unnecessary for the last ten years or so. However with the way our winter has been this year I may have to eat my words as well as a lot of my trees. I cannot remember a winter this severe and I have lived here nearly fifty years.

I have not seen most of them since before Thanks Giving in November.

I know you know this, Vance, but I feel it's important to state that if your temperate trees have been consistently covered by snow, they will not have been harmed by the extremely cold temps your area has been subjected to throughout the winter. The bigger concern I would have for your snow bound trees would be damage to branches due to settling snow and the gnawing of hungry rodents. I certainly hope they've weathered this winter without significant injury.