This 45 gallon tree, purchased from Beyond Paradise Nursery in Houston, was planted in December 2015. It was sold as a "Laurel Oak" (Quercus laurifolia) but I think it is actually a Darlington Oak - the leaves are more lance shaped than diamond shape and the bases of many of the leaves are U-shaped rather than V-shaped.
As Darlington Oaks supposedly prefer drier habitats than Laurel Oaks, I didn't give this tree too much water when watering (only the standard twice a week, using 6 gallons each time) - big mistake! Around July 2nd about 70% of the leaves turned brown, and fluttered to the ground with the faintest gust of wind. The upper canopy became almost totally bare. As soon as I saw this, I gave it a deep watering, and the remaining leaves stayed green. Finally on September 3rd, I noticed some tiny new leaves starting to emerge, however these never amounted to much. |
Darlington Oak (early July 2021). Dead top chopped off but the rest growing better than previous years.
Darlington Oak (early July 2020)
Darlington Oak (end of June 2019)
Darlington Oak (July 2018)
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On September 17th 2016 there were a few new leaves near the top of the tree, but it stopped again at that point.
In the spring of 2017, the Darlington Oak leafed out again. The picture below is from March 14th.
The picture below is from March 25th.
On April 1st 2017, some of the leaves had withered and become orangey-brown - looked like anthracnose.
On May 6th, the orangey brown fungus had not proliferated and it looked like the tree had stabilized - there were many dead twigs high up on the tree as a result of the previous year's under-watering episode. By August 19th 2017, the tree had not put out any new growth since late March and the upper branches were looking steadily sparser. The lower branches still looked good. To try to reinvigorate this tree, during the winter I pruned off all the upper branches (which had shown sparse growth in 2017 and 2016) except for the central leader. The tree looked weird after that but leafed out in the spring of 2018 quite well. The picture below is from April 22nd 2018. The tree made it through 2019, but still has not shown vigorous growth and still has the misshapen appearance due to the pruning in early 2018.
In 2020 the central leader is looking even more sparse. In autumn 2020 the Darlington Oak produced its first crop of acorns.
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Darlington Oak (July 2017)
Darlington Oak (July 2016)
Darlington Oak (spring 2016)
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