HELP! Almost all of my bottle brush are dying

12 years ago

Help!! My bottle brush are dying. About 3 years ago I moved into this house and the bottle brush were very healthy it looked. I live next to a canal that was covered years ago and now has only concrete pipe. 20 feet from the row of bottle brush is a huge huge eucalyptus. I also have near by, a kind of a Willow tree but medium in size. A mulberry is just 3 feet away also and another one further and it's gone now. I am trying to grow a blood orange tree and it seems the top is dying but there is new growth at the bottom. My bottle brush are in a row along a wood fence I put up when I moved in. I had 12 green and mid sized bottle brush. Now I am down to 6 and each one is starting to die from the top going down. I have been watering all trees but Ithought the bottle brush were drought resistant or tolerant

http://i164.photobucket.com/albums/u29/Bloodlet2007/S4010075.jpg

http://i164.photobucket.com/albums/u29/Bloodlet2007/S4010074-1.jpg

My pops had dug a little trench along the bottom about 2 years ago and decided t oflood it. Since then my trees have been dying. I tried to do the same also about 1.5 year ago to the mulberry and now its pretty much gone. It looks worse now than in the photo. The photo was taken 3 months back.

http://i164.photobucket.com/albums/u29/Bloodlet2007/S4010072.jpg

Is there anything I can do to save any of them? The other trees are doing fine so far, I have another mulberry that gets watered a lot cause of the grass but I have even been watering the other tree and they are not doing good. I do water the grass with the water from the canal using a pump .

Comment (1)

nmgirl
12 years ago
It's hard to tell from the photos, esp. the ones in the shadow, but some points in your message and photos stand out.

Re: Fence:
Those plants are very close to the fence. Did you cut any roots when you installed it? In the photos they're in the shadow and with being that close to the fence, they may not have enough light. They certainly are crowded and cramped.
The pruning on the bottle brush and mulberry leaves a lot to be desired too.

Re: Soil surface
It looks very exposed and parched. Have you thought about mulching around the plants? It would help hold the moisture in the soil. There's also exposed roots around the little mulberry.

Re: Trench
How close to the plants and how deep is it? Were any roots cut? How often do you flood the plants?
Instead of digging a trench you should build up a well around the plant out to the drip line, or where it should be. Fill the well to water, it should seep well down into the soil, say 6"-8".

How often and how much do you water? What method do you use to water the trees? What is the soil like?

What type of bottle brush tree do you have? There's a difference between being drought resistant/tolerant in a natural setting and being water stressed in a landscape.
I don't think your problems are of the sudden onset sort.
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