Moving in this June. Lovely house and I'm excited for new outdoor projects. What can I even do here? That's the root ball. Tree is alive, for now.
Can I remove a portion of upper root ball to lessen the bulge here? Or is only solution to(eventually) remove entire tree?
by Live-Variation-5184
4 Comments
I’ll assume this is from the ridiculous mulch piling that people do. Hopefully an actual arborist weighs in
There will be layer upon layer of girdling roots. Will be a tough one to save long-term
Ahhh death volcanoes. You need an arborist to remove any roots girdling the trunk. They use compressed air or a pressure washer to get a visual of the roots. It’s quite an operation.
Wow…this is horrific. As a Certified Arborist, I want to come out and pound some sense into the previous owner.
This occurred because of one of two errors. Either they piled a super high amount of mulch around the tree (Google “mulch volcano”), or they piled a super high amount of soil around the base of the tree to plant flowers. (EDIT: Just saw that they did this on all the trees in the 2nd picture…so that’s mulch volcano activity)
When soil or mulch is applied that high on the trunk, adventitious roots will sprout of the trunk to try to keep the tree alive. I see some of these in both pictures, especially the second picture. The problem with the adventitious roots is that they grow in all directions, including around the base of the trunk. This leads to girdling roots, which will choke the tree and kill it.
I don’t think we’re at the strangulation phase yet, but this needs to be fixed. I’d recommend hiring an arborist with an air spade to blast the soil away. The adventitious roots can then be trimmed back, especially those that are wrapped around the trunk. Follow this up with irrigation and fertilization of the yard, and hope for the best.