Dead leaves on Beech

Hi, i planted around 50 bare root copper beech trees in my garden as a fence last jan/feb. Sine then they've come on well, but i've noticed a lot of them seem to have some dead wood and some dead leaves, as shown. Is this normal for new trees or have i got a problem. Some that havenb't grown as much seem to have a lot if nto most of their leaves like this

 

not enough water is definitely not the problem this year, we've had 4 months of near constant rain

 

Hi mossym,

Bare root trees are difficult trees to get right as the root system is so easy to damage. I suspect that the trees are suffering from transplant shock - a general term given to the problems associated with moving trees from one environment to another. Out of 50 trees I would expect some to die and need to be replaced. I see that you have planted the trees next to a concrete wall; what are the ground conditions like?

 

ground wasn't the best, but i had better top soil added and used compost and farmyard manure(bagged stuff from b&q) to improve the soil. What i can't understand is why some leaves on trees are fine and others not...even to the extent of dead wood on some branches while the others seem fine.

i did plant about 5/6 spare(one of which is the one photographed), in case of a few dead ones. can the bare root trees still be suffering transplant shock after 9 months?

 

Trees can often show symptoms of damage years after the event. If only a handful of trees are showing signs of ill health then it's unlikely a problem with the soil conditions or aftercare. Did you pick the trees yourself?

 

nope they came bundled, some were smaller alright. but my parents have bought from teh nursery for years and trust them completely. so by extension i tned to as well

 

Sounds like transplant damage then, mossym. Either that or you've had cats in your garden p1ssing on 'em. Nothing much you can do except keep them from drying out and feed them in the spring. You can remove the dead growth for aesthetics because once dead it'll never come back.

 

thanks treesurfer. is there any point in trying to improve the soil now?

 

You've done the right thing by adding organic matter this year already. I wouldn't neccessarily add any more until next year. Going back to your photo, is that frost on the ground on the bottom left of the picture?

 

thans. no, it's not frost, it's a bit of sand left over from a bag of sand that was near that tree. does look like frost though

hasn't gotten that cold here yet(i'm in ireland). pity, if it had, the snow would make a nice change from the persistent rain