Fall Fertilizer Applications – New Service Offering
Arbortec Tree Service is excited to offer a Fall fertilizer soil injection to supplement your Spring/Summer fertilizer applications and provide year-round nutrients for your trees! The question is, what is this service and why is it important for the health of your trees?
Nutrients In Denver Soils For Trees
Our yardscapes are not often true recreations of natural forest settings. Trees often need extra help getting the necessary nutrients to their roots year-round.
It was due to a scarcity of nutrients in the soil that, prior to the 1800’s, the Denver metro area was mostly devoid of trees. This meant only those trees lining rivers and lakes could grow large, and in no great number. Since then, Denver’s vast urban forest has been established and has been maintained for the past 200+ years. This urban forest requires massive inputs of water and nutrients to maintain.
As arborists learn more about the history of our soils and urban forests, we change our practices. We do this to ensure we’re doing the absolute best to care for your trees and provide lasting fixtures in our community’s landscapes. This is the case with new best practices for Fall fertilization of your trees.
Best Fall Fertilizer For Trees
In Spring and Summer we use fertilizer with nitrogen to promote new growth. If using this same fertilizer in the Fall months, a tree can get the wrong message from the nitrogen. Newly accessible nitrogen in the tree’s roots triggers a growth response. We don’t want new growth during the Fall since this is when the leaves of deciduous trees are getting ready to drop for the Winter.
Just like in Spring and Summer, however, your trees need micronutrients during the Fall months. To meet this need, Arbortec Tree Service offers a Fall soil injection of fertilizers to help replenish the soil prior to the Winter months.
We use a mix of humic acid, mycorrhizae, and micronutrient supplements diluted in water. This mixture, effectively a feed or fertilizer, is injected into the soil around the tree. This helps fight iron chlorosis for oaks, maples, and other species that have a tough time in the clay-rich soils. Clay-rich soils are exactly what we have along the Front Range.
Fertilizer Treatments And Leaf Fungus
Nitrogen-based fertilizers can also exacerbate fungal spreading. For this reason, in addition to general use in Fall, you may also wish to use the Fall fertilizer treatment for stressed trees with leaf fungus. Consult with your arborist to see if this option is the right choice for your trees.
In particular, we recommend crabapple trees affected by fire blight receive a Fall fertilizer treatment or a low-nitrogen Spring application. This is to ensure we don’t help the fungus spread.
Have any questions about Fall Fertilization or interested in getting this service for your trees? Give us a call at (303) 466-3175, email us at info@arbortectree.com, or submit a request via our Request A Quote Page!
Header photo courtesy of Kimberly Earp on Unsplash.