Trees Planted too Deep

The area going from the trunk to the roots is the trunk flare which makes up a very critical cell structure for the tree's transition from full oxygen to earth.

Covering this area will lead to decline and will show damage in the tree around the 12 to 15 year age span.

Damage will be acceptability to freeze kill back on certain branches, reduced leaf size and overall canopy fullness. It's like a slow starvation for the tree.

Here is a very detailed article about the symptoms.

A tree should not look like a fence post or telephone pole in the ground. There should always be some kind of flare out from the root structure. If there isn't you need to uncover that area. However what you will often find is that the tree is pushing adventitious (small fibrous looking roots) up around the trunk flare now.

It is not a good idea to use a shovel in this are in that you can damage the larger scaffolding roots or trunk area. The answer is to use air. The industry name is a airspade which simply means a large volume air compressor blowing the dirt off the root system.

You can see how the dirt flies with concentrated air power. This work above is loosening compacted dirt around the roots, you can see the trunk flare is fine on that tree. Below is a tree that has been air excavated after being planted too deep and showing signs of decline.

You can obviously see the dirt line, we are just getting down to the root flare at the bottom

For More on this case click here.

 

You can rent an air compressor and begin excavating that area around your tree if this is an issue. Warning; you will take a dirt bath so wear all the safety equipment to protect yourself.

 

Drainage off this root area is also important and can be done at the same time.