Native Plants

Q. Who is Mr. Smarty Plants?

A: There are those who suspect Wildflower Center volunteers are the culpable and capable culprits. Yet, others think staff members play some, albeit small, role. You can torture us with your plant questions, but we will never reveal the Green Guru's secret identity.

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Thursday - July 19, 2012

From: Garner, NC
Region: Southeast
Topic: Planting, Transplants, Trees
Title: Transplant shock in pecan tree in Garner NC
Answered by: Barbara Medford

QUESTION:

I transplanted a pecan tree about 3 weeks ago & been watering it 3 times a day. The leaves are turning brown & crumbly before I water it. After I water it, the leaves are brown but I can scratch the trunk or limbs & it's green. Is it too far gone to try to save it? If not, what can I do?

ANSWER:

On our "Ask Mr. Smarty Plants" page there is a search feature in which you type in a couple of words and press "Go." We use this function frequently because we get so many similar or identical questions. When we searched on "transplant shock" we got 238 hits. We chose one that not only has several links, but those links lead to still other websites. To summarize, never, ever plant a tree in the heat of the summer, anywhere. If you planted that tree three weeks ago, it was about the end of June, when the temperatures in North Caroline were extremely hot. Please read all the articles, a lot of which are from Texas, because we always have extreme heat in Summer.