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Acer 'Winter Flame' - in trouble?

dominia30dominia30 Posts: 23
in Plants
We've had this acer (smaller version of Sango-kaku) about 3 years and moved it in the autumn to a new location where it seemed happy - produced superb red winter stems. But now the stems are beginning to turn brown with white patches (see photo). Is this normal or a problem and if so, anything to be done?

Posts

  • BobTheGardenerBobTheGardener Posts: 11,385
    Looks like Verticillium Wilt, unfortunately.
    All you can do is remove affected sections and cross your fingers.


    A trowel in the hand is worth a thousand lost under a bush.
  • amancalledgeorgeamancalledgeorge Posts: 2,736
    What appears like white patches is dead wood. My Sango-kaku had quite a bit of dead wood this year, presumably the lower temperatures caused it. They're quite slow to respond to water deficiency too, so any problems now is probably an effect of going dry in the very hot summer we had and then the hard frosts and snow that followed. All you can do is remove all dead wood, but do not prune into live branches as the sap is rising and could shock the plant. 
    To Plant a Garden is to Believe in Tomorrow
  • Pete.8Pete.8 Posts: 11,340
    I agree with Bob.
    I have an acer Katsura that suffered the same.
    I cut out all the affected growth and it has recovered very well with some tlc and plenty of water.
    The 'problem' is that it is no longer tree-like.
    Now it's a mass of shoots coming from lower on the main stem and it looks more like a multi-stemmed shrub than a tree. It looks fine, just not very tree-like

    Billericay - Essex

    Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit.
    Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.
  • dominia30dominia30 Posts: 23
    Oh dear, sounds like bad news... Thanks all, I'll try pruning, but fear it may have spread too far. Fingers crossed anyway!
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