Potentilla

[roelex14]

Here's a Potentilla fruticosa that was chopped back from nursery stock. It has been putting on new growth, but lost a bit of its fragile foliage today in high winds that I wasn't anticipating. Dead wood is not done, worked on it for a little bit but then a series of storms moved into the area and I had to close up the house and such. Has a lot of clean up still. For now, I am just going to let it start growing out again and recover from what it lost. Let me know what ya think...

 

[John Ruger]

That's really interesting and it has great potential. I did not know that they took well to dead wood, so what are your plans for treating it?

 

[roelex14]

They are actually really easy to work with, all you do it split the top of the branch (with a branch splitter like you would with other types of trees) and then they just peel all the way down the trunk. I plan to treat the dead wood with lime sulfur, but may wait until next year. Its kind of been struggling and i'm not sure why. Bits of the foliage just randomly falls off, but others are doing fine. My guess is due to them getting broken from either moving it or from wind. hopefully it pulls through.

 

[amkhalid]

Nice potentilla roelex. BIG one too... Let it grow unchecked for the rest of the year to thicken up that from live vein in the front.

If it were mine, and the tree is strong next spring, I would remove that top branch and build a new, lower crown with the shoots that will come out of the trunk.

Keep us posted!