A: There are many things that could cause bark on a tree to split: mechanical damage, animal damage, a lightening strike, even a fluctuating weather pattern. The weather rapidly toggling between mild ...

Q: We have a beautiful Autumn Blaze maple tree with a split trunk bark. We’re wondering if it’s dying and if there is anything to be done to save it. We’d sure appreciate any advice. — Cliff and Nancy ...

Moving into warmer weather after the cold weather we had at the end of January, we start to see a common, but alarming, sight on trees, southwest injury, also called sunscald.

Q. I planted three redbud trees (variety Merlot) in August 2022 when we moved into our new house. Now, one of the three appears to be dead, with the bark split in several places along the length of ...

Frost cracks appear as vertical splits in the trunk of a tree and are the result of plant tissue expansion and contraction.

I heard a new term this week, “exploding trees.” After more than 30 years with Purdue Extension, I’ve never heard a Purdue specialist use it. But it’s currently a popular story in the media and on ...

We have a crabapple tree that has very severe splitting in almost all of the major branches. There is some evidence of old bark splits that healed over that we did not notice until recently. The tree ...