I love water and trees! I love the lake so much that I currently own 2 boats! (Anyone want to buy one?) I love trees too, but I am not a fan of when the 2 meet. This is a photo of Lake Allatoona in Georgia last week. It is much worse now! SO bad that we are all canoeing to the docks. FUN STUFF, let me tell you.
ANYWAY all this has me thinking, hmmm what about the poor old trees?? I know the answer, and I am going to share that with you.
FIRST a little Trees 101.
A tree has 2 root systems, a structure root system that just (well not JUST, it is rather important) hold the tree up. The are the ones that look like underground branches. The important ones for this subject are the feeder roots. They are the tiny ones that you have to get though when you are digging a hole in the woods. They are somewhere between the diameter of a human hair and a piece of pinestraw. They are the workhorse of the tree. They bring up nutrients and water, store energy, breathe, and all kinds of stuff that we don’t even know about yet. (research is showing that the roots contain the brain) They really are the most important part of the tree. They are only in the top 6″ of soil. They have to grow or they die. Now, think about how hard it must be to grow though soil..especially in heavy soils like Georgia Red Clay. Now imagine the weight of all that water, the sediment that may be left behind, toxins, and all those O2 pockets full of water. Not a good deal, right?
The good news is that most hardwood trees are still dormant, so those roots are asleep and they should not be badly affected. BUT THE PINES..(BTW, never say, “just a pine” to an Arborist) HMMM. They take little sips of water all winter on the days that they get warm… as there always are warm days in February in Georgia.
The maples are also waking up and I expect to see a little damage on them also.
One other important fact I need you to understand is how SSSLOOOOWWW trees do everything. They grow slow, they respond to conditions slow and they die slow, so this flood of 2020 will be killing trees in 2021 and beyond.
I expect pine beetles to be an issue over the next few years.. so if you have a pine you love, I suggest protecting it from an invasion. Pine beetles can and do kill trees in a week.
I said all that to say this, if you have trees and their roots are underwater, then you will want to get to know an Arborist. There are many tools in our box that can really help them through this. The trees do not have to die.