American Elms (late June 2023). Elm #1 is the first picture below. A partial view of the Elms planted from seed is the second picture - they are getting really tall, and flourishing.
American Elm - original planting (mid July 2022, first picture), and planted from seed (early July 2020, second picture)
American Elm tree leaf details from April. The leaves are rough on both sides.
We planted the American Elm in April 2014. It was a mail-order tree from Nearly Native Nursery in Georgia and it always leafs out a month or so later than the native elms in this region. This was one of our healthiest, fastest growing trees and had reached a tremendous height and girth only 2 years after planting. Only the sycamore and cottonwood were on par with its growth rate. It developed a very bushy bottom in 2015 and I pruned off the lower branches in the 2015/16 winter. It had transformed from a spindly twig into a good looking tree. However, in July 2017, it started not doing nearly as well as previous years. The uppermost twigs barely leafed out. I thought it was either damage from freezing temperatures (25degF) during the last winter when the uppermost twigs still had green leaves, or Dutch Elm Disease and this was what is known as "flagging". I pruned off the sparse looking branches and new leaves continued to grow. On August 19th 2017, all other American Elms in the neighborhood (including some trees ~50ft tall) suddenly suffered from their entire canopy becoming brown - not sure why this was but it seems to happen every year. My tree does not have this affliction. On April 22nd 2018, the Elm again did not leaf out at the ends of its branches. Also one major branch only had a few small leaves on it. There was no sign of the dark streaks along the sapwood when I cut the branches so it does not look like Dutch Elm Disease - perhaps it's an issue with root rot. The Elm trees around the area that suffered in August 2017 from yellowing / browning leaves all put out vigorous new growth with large green leaves in spring - the only Elm I know that is suffering is the one in my yard. I pruned several branches in January of 2019, and in spring the Elm leafed out vigorously, but then in mid summer, as in previous years, it lost most of its leaves towards the ends of its branches, and by September only had a few leaves remaining. In the meantime in the "seedling patch", two tiny 1 inch high American Elm seedlings I planted in 2018 from seeds collected in nearby Lake Jackson, have grown to more than 7 feet in height! The picture below is from November 1st 2019.
By April 2021, the American Elms planted from seed were showing a new disease in the form of galls on some of the leaves.