Oaks dieing and breaking over?

[Catscratch]

The neighbor and I are having an alarming amount of mature oaks break over. Mine have mostly been breaks in the trunks with a few uprooting, his has mostly been uprooting. Anyone have ideas? I've thought of "oak wilt" and "gypse moths", but not sure either are right. I've also considered damage from a fire long ago that is being weakened by the last several yrs of drought.

 

[PatinPA]

I've had a noticeable amount of oaks that died or just fell over in the last few years as well. We get a lot of gypsy moth but I haven't noticed any of them lately.

 

[Brian662]

When they are close to each other like the first pic, I would assume it could be oak wilt. Are they all red oaks?

 

[Ben.MN/WI]

I have a lot of oak wilt on my property and they usually die during the growing season and then years later once the roots rot down, they will blow over. Usually what is left of the roots will then pop up. That center tree in your top picture with the partially missing bark and dead branches looks like it could be oak wilt, but it is really hard to say for sure.

It appears that the center of the bigger trees are rotten and hollow, which made them weak and they likely snapped off in a storm when the leaves acted like a sail and caught the wind. I don't know the cause of that inner tree damage though, but that has not been common on my oaks that died from oak wilt. I had several large oaks snap over like that when a tornado blew through a few years ago and some of the trees were hollow inside even though they otherwise looked healthy. Perhaps you had a strong wind recently that took out the trees that were defective with rotten trunks?

 

[Catscratch]

I think they are mostly red oaks, but I'm not sure. I have not noticed a single chinquapin oak that has done this (they are white oaks). Will have to look closer to see if any of them are burr's.

I'm in KS. Not uncommon to have a 40+mph wind day once a month or so. I don't doubt windy days are breaking them but 5yrs ago the same winds were not breaking them.

I'm a little worried about all my oaks getting wiped out due to a disease, but if it happens we'll just have to adapt and hope for the next stage to be a good one.

 

[TreeDaddy]

I lost many post oaks after the drought of 2011

Also our "Snowmageddon" a few years ago

I believe it takes a few years to see the full damage of these events in terms of tree mortality

bill

 

[Ben.MN/WI]

I think they are mostly red oaks, but I'm not sure. I have not noticed a single chinquapin oak that has done this (they are white oaks). Will have to look closer to see if any of them are burr's.

I'm in KS. Not uncommon to have a 40+mph wind day once a month or so. I don't doubt windy days are breaking them but 5yrs ago the same winds were not breaking them.

I'm a little worried about all my oaks getting wiped out due to a disease, but if it happens we'll just have to adapt and hope for the next stage to be a good one.

If it is oak wilt, you will slowly see trees dying adjacent to the first dead trees. I was told it can travel quickly through roots of adjacent trees that have grown together.

I brought out a DNR forester to look at my woods and offer suggestions on what to do to save my oaks. He told me most of the trees in the red oak family will continue to die off, so I had all of my larger red and black oaks logged off.

 

[GMan5465]

Stressed oaks are then susceptible to the two lined chestnut borer. Mine were stressed from the drought, also we have oak wilt in the area. I’ll probably lose most of them over time.

 

[The Fishman]

When the trees are that far gone, it is tough to say what happened. One possible cause that hasn't been mentioned is bacterial leaf scorch. Hopefully BLS didn't cause it since there isn't a lot you can do once the trees become infected.

https://www.missouribotanicalgarden...iseases/bacterial-spots/bacterial-leaf-scorch

https://plantpathology.ca.uky.edu/files/ppfs-or-w-12.pdf