Arbor Tech

Arbor Tech works on trees in the St. George area. Two things this climate does to a tree are invisible until they are serious, and both come from the same source: the amount of solar radiation reaching bark that evolved somewhere gentler.

The wider picture

Sunscald is direct injury to bark from sun and heat. Thin-barked species - young trees generally, and maples, fruit trees and ornamental pears in particular - can have the cambium killed on the sun-facing side of the trunk, typically the southwest, where afternoon sun is strongest and reflected heat off a driveway or a wall adds to it. The bark cracks, sinks and eventually sloughs away, leaving a long dead strip that becomes an entry point for decay and borers. It happens most to newly planted trees that came from a nursery row where their neighbors shaded the trunk, and to established trees suddenly exposed when something beside them is removed. Trunk wrap or a light-colored trunk paint through the first several years is the standard prevention, along with leaving lower branches on a young tree longer than looks tidy, since they shade their own trunk.

Timing matters for the same reason. Pruning opens the canopy and exposes interior wood and bark that has never seen direct sun, so a heavy summer thinning can scald branches that were fine the week before. The general practice is to do structural pruning in the dormant season, keep summer work light, and avoid removing so much canopy at once that the remaining bark is left unshaded in the strongest part of the year.

More on this: the Red Hills Desert Garden and landscaping companies. The directory lists all Tree Service.