Olive, Pine and Palm Tree Question

Hi,

I love your column; it has been a source of much-needed information. I have been enjoying your works for years now, and I finally have a question for you. I hope you can help me. It is about my Olive trees, my Palm tree, and My Pine Trees. My husband and I have been living in this home for about ten years now. When we first bought this home, we were told that the trees were fine and just needed to be watered more. I believed them, and so we started to water several times per week. At first, the trees began to look better. This went on for a few years until one of the trees (The Olive Tree) started to have a few branches die, and so I hired an Arborist who said that it was a natural die back and fertilized them. He did all of my trees, and they looked great for about six months or so until I noticed that now not only did the Olive Tree start looking funny and weak but so did the other trees. So I had the Arborist come back, and he said that there was a broken line and that the trees were getting flooded. So we fixed the line and went back to water three times per weeks for about 15 min each time. The trees did not recover and haven’t looked well since then. Now they are getting worse and watering more only seems to make it worse. Now The Pine trees are looking light colored instead of dark green, the Palm tree, I was told by the Arborist, that it may have a deadly Palm disease and may have to be cut down since they say there is no cure for it?

Is it too late for you to help us?

Thanks

Pam and John

Hello!

Sorry to hear you are having these problems.

There out your story, you do not mention the word compost. So I called you and had a nice talk.

You told me that you had sprinklers for those trees and not drip. You also said that you never applied compost or mulch at all during the whole time you have been living there.  It took me a bit of prodding you, but you finally told me that these trees are next to your lawn. Surrounded on three sides by lawns. It took a bit more prodding to find out that the only watering the trees were getting was the sprinklers that you were using for the lawn, which explains why you were watering three times per week. I also found out that the timing was changed and now you are watering every day just to keep the lawn green. I guess you figured the trees were getting plenty of watering from the lawn sprinklers?

Ok

A few things:

First

The chemical lawn fertilizer you are using is very bad for the trees. They are like cocaine for trees and not only damages the root systems but promotes rapid growth at the expense of mineral availability. You should change over to an organic low nitrogen fertilizer. You should top dress the lawn with live compost four times per year. Do not water every day, Water deeply three times per week max.

The trees require an entirely different water cycle and fertilization cycle.

The trees you mention, actually do not need to get water at all! Take a look at these same trees in places where they are growing without any one watering them. The only water they get is when it rains or from the fog. The usually get below ground watering. So all you have to do is to provide once a month of deep watering to allow the water to get down into the ground.

Trees and lawns do not do well together. I would replace the water hog lawn with a native grass like Kurapaia, which is a ca native. Try Soils Solutions. By using less water and only organic fertilizers as well as putting in a drip line just for the trees, you will be helping the trees to recover. If you do not start now, your trees will each attract a different disease or pests specific to those trees. Yes, the Palm Tree will get a disease that will kill it, the Pine Trees a bark beetle that will kill it and the Olive Tree a dif beetle that will kill it. Nature goes after the weak. Overwatering always makes trees more vulnerable and open to attack by pests and diseases.

To help the trees now, you must do foliar spraying. That is applying nutrition through their leaves. This will ensure that they are getting their vitamins and minerals while you are working on restoring their root systems by using rock dust, organic fertilizer with microbes and then mulling with Azalea/Gardenia mix. Why this combination; because our soil is clay and way too alkaline. Many folks get their gardeners to remove any leaves or pine needles that fall continuously. This is bad, and they should leave them on the ground. They help the soil when it decomposes. You should be applying compost several times per year. I am also betting that what you need right away is a few truck loads of garden soil and compost blend. Try Peach Hill Soils. They have clean sewer sludge free, Urea free soil. Always ask if they have these things in their mix and that you do not want that in the mix! I would dump a few inches of the soil over your entire property and then mulch over that. I believe you do not have any top soil and must address this issue first if any of your trees are to survive this coming climate changes.

Organic Gardeners!

Thanks for sending me your info about your organic gardening services in Malibu! I will contact you and do a short interview before I can recommend your company.

Keep sending me your questions, I love it!!

Any questions send me an email at andylopez@invisiblegardener.com

Love

andy Lopez

Invisible Gardener

Did you get my new book  (Don’t Panic, It’s Organic!) yet? The Ebook version is free just by mentioning Surfside News or this blog!!