Thanks so much, fruit trees are not the easiest to look after. There seems to be a spray for each season, insect, fungus per tree. Wow! I'm up to it all, BUT to lose a tree is not fun. I'll take your advice, not operate, and spray some captan on the wound. Hope that helps. I'll also email Raintree and see what they have to say. Many thanks again!

Same here. Help, please! I found 2 black tar spots last year but they looked like a little black tar ooze. This year there are 10+ spots on the main trunk spread between ground level to about 3 feet tall, facing East only. Nothing on the side that faces West. Each black tar spot became a dime-size tar ball that's really hard. We pried a few off but don't know what's causing it and how to stop it, or if it's damaging the tree. Our Fuyu Persimmon tree is old, 2-story tall, the trunk is 1 foot in diameter, produces hundreds of large ripe sweet fruit. This year has a much smaller crop due to the California drought and crazy green parrots that eat everything in sight. We're in SoCal Pasadena area. Any advise is greatly appreciated. If you know how to effectively chase away the crazy green parrots, please share too. We tried CDs in the tree, crows took them. Eagle eye balloons, birds got used to them. Now we are using motion sensor sprinkler (the ScareCrow), still can't keep hundreds of green parrots and squirrels away. Uh. Thanks.

Dax and Dave -- Thanks so much for your replies. I went back out and looked at the tree again this morning in the area around the wound. I'm attaching some more photos. There is a girdling type wound around the entire trunk in the area of the original wound. All of the sap is oozing above this point, and none below. I would try the treatment that was successful for Dave, but am not sure where to start and stop cutting because of the girdled area around the trunk. Can you suggest where I need to begin and end the wood removal, and if you think that would work in this particular situation. (We would normally have made a cleaner cut of the branch, but because it was tearing the bark we didn't cut further. I should have gone back and made a cleaner cut after the bark healed.) Thanks again!! Kim

How's the tree?