The before and after on my neighbor's live oak after one bad storm

So I've been watching this big live oak in my neighbor's front yard for about 2 years now. It always looked healthy enough, tons of leaves, nice shape. Then last spring we got a nasty thunderstorm here in Atlanta that dropped like 3 inches of rain in an hour. The next morning I walked by and saw that one whole side of the crown had split open, just hanging there like a broken arm. He called me to help clean it up, and under all that canopy it was totally rotten in the crotch where that big limb came off. I ended up taking off maybe 40% of the crown to get it balanced again. Six months later and that tree looks completely different, way more open and sparse but at least it won't kill anyone now. Has anyone else seen a healthy-looking tree hide rot like that until a storm forces your hand?

3 comments

3 Comments

ellis.leo5d ago

Ngl I think that tree was probably already struggling long before that storm hit.

joel_martinez5d ago

Man, my buddy had the exact same thing happen last year. Walked out one morning, giant oak just split in half. Thought it was the storm too, but when the arborist came by, he said it had been rotting from the inside for years. @ellis.leo is right, storms just find the weak ones.

shanelee4d ago

My cousin's oak fell on his shed last Tuesday. No storm, just Tuesday.