Leaking Trees and Canker Diseases

Fairly often we are called out to look at trees that appear to be leaking.  There are a few possible causes for this.  Fresh wounds that penetrate through the bark and into the sapwood (outer layers of wood, busy moving water and nutrients from soil to leaf) will sometimes leak some sap until that wound dries.  Infection with bacterial wetwood will lead to frothy, stinky liquid oozing from wounds.  It’s gross but not a problem for the tree.

Insect damage may lead to gummosis, which is gummy-sappy stuff coming out of the tree.  Unfortunately, gummosis is also often caused by serious tree diseases like cystospora, phytophthora, and Botryosphaeria fungi.  These may lead to sap oozing, gummosis, and bark staining.  They feed on the “living rind” of the tree (sapwood + cambium + inner bark), disrupting the flow of water up and energy down, so both leaves and roots suffer.  Cankers develop on the trunk and branches.

Cankers are dead spots in the “living rind”.  They often are still covered by outer bark, but that may look sunken, cracked or wet.  The canker will live for years, spreading as the tree fights to contain it. The disease may spread up and down the wood, popping up in a new spot.

These diseases are untreatable.  The best approach is to improve tree health and thus slow the disease down.  A healthy tree may contain a canker in isolation for years.  A stressed tree will not! Legacy Tree Company can consult on optimizing tree health, so give us a call.

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