Ueno Yama dog attack

[RAB82]

Over the weekend we had some wind that knocked my young Ueno Yama maple to the ground. My dog decided to perform her own "pruning". She topped the tree, stripped some bark off the trunk, and pulled it out of the pot. Luckily it was cool and raining, so the roots looked ok. It was previously in a nursery pot, but I decided to go ahead and put in a training pot with different medium to (hopefully) allow the roots to recover and grow. The tree was about 3' tall and growing well.

My question is how will the trunk with the bark stripped off heal? And/or is it worth trying to airlayer since the bark is already removed and the likelihood of decent healing is low?

Thanks in advance for any insight.

 

[ponderingsage]

It looks like it is grafted an inch or so above the purple tag, so air layering could be an option to explore any way.

On terms of care, l would cut the wound cleanly below the gnawed end.

Looks like it still has a good branch, so should be good. You may want to provide some shade for a few weeks as a safeguard.

 

[Shibui]

Is there any intact bark around that lower chewed area? All the photos show debarked wood but all seem show one side. Without any intact bark, food cannot move from leaves back down to roots and the tree will die.

The debarked area is significant in proportion to the trunk size. If the tree lives, it could eventually heal over - sooner if the tree is allowed to grow significantly. It is highly likely there will be signs of the scar for many years even if it does manage to heal completely.

There should be enough foliage above the damaged area for a successful layer if tat's the way you want to go.

 

[RAB82]

Thank you all for the thoughts. I did look to see if there was any continuation of bark from leaves to roots. There is only a little, I think I will go ahead and attempt to air layer off.