Here's a close up of the broken limbs (darned ice & snow):

Should we cut them and seal the wound? We'll also need to trim the bottom 2 layers of branches so the tree doesn't look or grow strange. Do I do that now or wait? I can also stop by a local nursery for advice, but I can't carry the picture around with me! LOL

Any advice is welcome! Thanks!
Paula

P.S. Yes, that the In-laws place in the background, but more importanly - that's my new garden space minus the grass!!!

We discuss growing everything here....not just veggies and flowers but also trees, lawn grasses, native grasses and ornamental grasses, vines, berries, fruit, shrubs, and trees and even fungi (mushrooms!). : )

I'm not a tree expert but when we have storm damage to a tree we prune off the affected limbs just above the branch collar. We don't seal with anything but lots of people do use pruning paint to seal cut surfaces. I don't know what the current extension service recommendations are on sealing or not sealing cuts with pruning paint. If for some reason the damage extends below the branch collar (between the branch collar and the trunk) or there is damage that cuts into the trunk, the odds of preventing eventual decay in the damaged trunk are fairly low. I hope Randy or Scott or someone who knows more about tree maintenance than I do sees this post and reponds to it.

After every major ice storm, the Oklahoma Forestry Service usually puts out a bulletin or news release detailing what homeowners can and should do to save and protect their plants that received storm damage. I'll try to google and find their info and link it below. I know they had a bulletin on this topic after one of the big ice storms several years ago.

Everything looks so blissful and peaceful there with all the pretty white snow on the ground. It's raining here so we have big puddles and lots of mud....same old, same old thing we've had all winter.

Dawn

And Scott - is it a good sign that the stems of my fall-planted blueberries are still green? They're pretty covered with pecan hulls.

Blissful? Well, kinda...and that pic was taken this evening from my front porch so you can see what a clear view the in-laws have. Guess they just can't help but watch our every move! And we've had sooo much melting already....hope it all gone before the next round next week!

Paula

I would remove all the limbs on that bottom whorl and not worry about sealing wounds. I'm not up to date with the extension's newer recommendations, but in the 90's it was to use nothing at all. Just keep the tree happy and healthy and it will heal on it's own.

I have massive wounds on trees here from the Dec. 2007 storm. They seem to be recovering OK.

In fact that storm killed off all my big pines. They were over 30 years old. The year of drought, then the floods, then the drought again. The ice done them in it did. A very sad winter it was. :-)

My house is hiding under all that.

I feel really bad for all of you that are going through it now. My trees were in such bad shape from 2007, they couldn't be hurt any worse.

randy

Wow! Your house is almost completely hidden. Your poor trees. I'm amazed none of the trees have fallen onto the house.

I cannot imagine what the recurring ice storms have done to the trees in much of Oklahoma. Somehow we have escaped all but the most minor damage, which I attribute to being so far south. And, you know, y'all hear me complain in drought years when the rain goes just to our west our east and misses us over and over and over again....but you never hear me complain about the ice missing us!

Our tree damage here tends to come from the occasional drecho wind or severe thunderstorms accompanied by high winds and it is usually just a few limbs or a tree or two snapped in half, and doesn't even come close to the levels of damage caused by ice storms.

I've looked at some photographs online from southwestern OK's tree damage from the recent storm and I don't know if they're gonna have many trees left standing by the time they get that whole mess cleaned up. As of yesterday, there still were entire towns (small ones) in southwestern OK that still do not have their power back. Entire towns. It is hard to imagine.

Dawn

OK, I'm soppy enuf...

=) Paula

It is hard to see beautiful trees just torn apart by ice storms. The ice storms are probably the one weather feature that caught me by surprise here. Even though I grew up only about 80 miles south of where we now live, I'd only seen 1 or 2 icestorms in Fort Worth that were even bad enough to get any media attention....and they were nothing at all compared to Oklahoma ice storms.

Most of the ice storms stay either to our southwest or north and I am grateful for that.

Our son went to the Tulsa area a few weeks after the 2007 ice storm and was left speechless by the massive tree damage.

I don't think this week's Sun/Mon storm will leave us with much ice or snow here in OK and I surely do hope it blows through fast. The models are still inconsistent on the Thursday storm and I am watching the NWS and blogger sites to see what those folks say as the arrival of that storm comes closer.

I understand we'll have a lot of cold wind, so wind chills will be very low at times.

Hopefully the already damaged trees in our state will do all right this week....it is likely that damaged trees that are still standing may come down, in whole or in part, when the wind is blowing hard.

It sure seems like the trees have a target on them this year.

Dawn

Moni

Now the pines across the back....they're looking better. We thought this last storm had broken more limbs, but with the warm up (well, sorta) we can see they're in as good of shape as we could hope for. In fact, the tree I pictured here looks much better today. Seems like the tree was under stress with the broken limbs, but having removed them, all the others have perked up and look much better.

Thanks, guys, for all your help! Was comforting to me just to be able to ask and get some input!