Can I Revive an Old Crabapple Tree?

Joanna in Canton says, ‘I have a question. I have a flowering crabapple tree and it’s been here since I’ve lived in the house, 36 years. And the guy that does the yard he said that the tree was dying. It didn’t flower this year in the spring like it normally does. So I just wanted to know is there something that I can do to save the tree?’

To revive it and bring it back around, now again he was on site so he may see things that I’m not gonna see because it’s not right in front of me. However a tree that old is generally used up a significant amount of the nutrients out of the soil. And so by adding a significant amount of nutrients back to the soil, mother nature is gonna tell you within generally one season whether that tree is going to bounce back or not.

You don’t want to fertilize this time of year, but early spring I would get very aggressive with like our all-season fertilizer. It lasts for six months so you only have to do it once and it’ll feed the tree for a whole year. Normally on trees we recommend you know, five to seven scoops. On a tree like that with that type of age and that massive amount of root system, we’re probably going to recommend more like 10 or 12 or 15 scoops. And there’s a scooper inside the the bags that we sell, and you’re never gonna burn with that fertilizer. That’s the one beautiful thing about it, it releases so slowly and it’ll be like an IV for the tree and help the tree recover.

Now if the tree has something else going on, whether it be bores or some type of insect or something like that, generally we’re gonna look at the leaves. Now this time of year most of the crab apples have started to go dormant, so they’re dropping their leaves already, but in the springtime if/when the leaves first come out, if you notice any discoloration on the leaves or spotting on the leaves, go ahead and bring those leaves in. Let us take a look at them and we can guide you to what’s going on with it and what you can use to fix it. But the number one thing is that fertilizer.

It’s going to sleep right now, we just want to let it rest, go to sleep for wintertime. You don’t really have to worry about watering a tree of that age. It should have a substantial root system, so I would say wait till spring and then let’s get aggressive with that fertilizer and see if we can bring that tree back around.

Most trees, depending on the variety of the tree, some are very short-lived some are longer lived, but I would say most crabapples are going to be 30 to 50 years. And again, you may be able to stretch that another 10 or 15 years by making sure the tree has the nutrients it needs to be successful.

Questions? Email us at [email protected] or call one of our two locations: Portage (330-499-0101) or Everhard (330-492-1243).