Cleaning bark caused deeper cuts

[Abhishek Dasgupta]

Hi ,

Asking on behalf of a friend . He was cleaning his juniper bark and in many places while peeling off the bark , it went deeper . Pics attached .

Am not a juniper guy at all and hence asking you guys here - is this a big problem ? I think not as the bark tissue will regenerate and cover all surfaces again in 2 years or so . But will appreciate you guys thoughts .

 

[leatherback]

hard to tell but it looks like he took all the bark off in areas. This will not cover over. But.. I cannot see whether those parts were even alive beforehand. Did you check to see where the living parts are?

 

[Abhishek Dasgupta]

hard to tell but it looks like he took all the bark off in areas. This will not cover over. But.. I cannot see whether those parts were even alive beforehand. Did you check to see where the living parts are?

Yes these were all living parts as far as he said . He was trying to take the bark off and in some areas it went deep to expose the white tissue .

 

[R0b]

Yes these were all living parts as far as he said . He was trying to take the bark off and in some areas it went deep to expose the white tissue .

Whats was he using to take the bark off?

 

[leatherback]

in some areas

I might be looking atr the wrong thing but.. this does not look like accidentally hitting the white. This is just cutting large strips off.

The aim of removing bark is to get the flaky loose stuff off. What has been done here is way more.

 

[Shibui]

Juniper bark is quite thick with many layers. The white I can see in these pics is still bark. The white under bark will soon change to brown outer bark so no problem to the tree. If you do go right through the bark the wood underneath is hard and shiny unlike in these pics. Even if you do cut right through the bark junipers heal quite rapidly. I have to regularly open up intentional shari on shimpaku junipers to stop them closing over.

 

[Brian Van Fleet]

He went too far, but it will be fine. Next time, maybe a softer touch.

 

[Abhishek Dasgupta]

Juniper bark is quite thick with many layers. The white I can see in these pics is still bark. The white under bark will soon change to brown outer bark so no problem to the tree. If you do go right through the bark the wood underneath is hard and shiny unlike in these pics. Even if you do cut right through the bark junipers heal quite rapidly. I have to regularly open up intentional shari on shimpaku junipers to stop them closing over.

He went too far, but it will be fine. Next time, maybe a softer touch.

Thanks ! Is there anything that is needed to be done to heal them better ?

It’s well protected from frost since we are in zone 4 and is in a green house .

The tree does need a repot badly as the soil has lost percolation and roots pushing the tree up in the pot . But our repotting starts at end of April . So can it still be repotted at that time ?

 

[Brian Van Fleet]

Nothing necessary. It will darken up by summer and look normal. It can still be repotted as planned.

 

[Abhishek Dasgupta]

Nothing necessary. It will darken up by summer and look normal. It can still be repotted as planned.

It does feel better to know this . Sadly I think a sandpaper was rubbed against the bark too hard which stripped the outermost layer exposing the white bark all over the trunk . I was gonna suggest a liquid cut paste- like top Jin or kiyonil that I apply over deciduous materials but wasn’t sure if it’s needed for a juniper .

 

[Abhishek Dasgupta]

The way I understand it is the white part is the exterior phloem and if we go deeper it becomes greenish which is the cambium layer and then even deeper is the xylem. If we reach xylem, it becomes a deadwood . In the above pics, I think only the phloem has been reached - so it went a little deeper . Nothing that should be of any bother I think but am just a newbie