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What's wrong with my elm tree?

7 years ago

last modified: 7 years ago

And please don't tell me its dutch elm disease...

Zone 5 - SE WI - Milwaukee area.

I noticed a few bare branches at the canopy to the left of the tree as in the photos and just in the last week a few pretty large branches have started to brown. We've had a decent amount of rain this spring. I did remove a hawthorn from the tree line this spring and did a shallow root grind on it and replaced it with a red bud. However, it is about 20 ft from the trunk and I don't think any major roots of the elm were cut.

It is hard to see the color in the pictures, but the red boxes show the die back and browning I am seeing. The yellow box on the trellis is where the redbud went.

Thanks for the help.

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Comments (5)

ken_adrian Adrian MI cold Z5
7 years ago
without getting up there.. and seeing if there is an injury.. i cant really add anything more ..

any bad windstorms.. since last fall .. any ice event??? ... etc ...

the injury could have been long ago .. since the leaves fell off ...

i know nothing about elm disease ...

ken
gursg24
Original Author
7 years ago
"any bad windstorms.. since last fall .. any ice event??? ... etc ..."

Nothing really out of the ordinary or that I would suspect caused any injury. Most of the leaves budded out per usual this spring, but just started seeing the browning/downing a week ago with the exception of the couple small, bare branches at the top left.

There has been a weeping wound on the trunk that you can see in the bottom pic when zoomed that was there before we moved here 5.5 years ago. Looks like a branch that came down. This year it looks more dry.
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jdo053103
7 years ago
Google Dutch Elm Disease, I am 95% sure that is what you have. What you see is called flagging or branch death. Nothing you can do at this point if it is dutch elm, i was hit hard a few years ago. I lost 13 elm trees total, a mix of winged elm and slippery elm.
gursg24
Original Author
7 years ago
Sorry to hear about your elms JD. We lost a 65 y.o. street elm to our house at our old post-war home right when we were moving to this house. Luckily the city didn't take it down until after we moved because it was jarring to see.

I believe you are right, but was hoping for some other possibilities.

Man, I have had a bad year for my trees. Lost a nice maple, ash, and 3 austrian pines all this spring. Now possibly my elm. My front spruces aren't doing great either.
jdo053103
7 years ago
Sorry to hear about your other trees, that's tough. That's why I like sweetgum trees, never seen one with any disease, lol. My elms were in a woods setting, since they were all root grafted it spread like wildfire. I have since moved from that home to a new home on a larger 1+ acre lot that was a former farm, planting what I want now. Going to be fun.

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