"Kay Lancaster" wrote in message
...
Hi all! Question for you regarding an 80-foot oak I have..... Over the

Are you sure that erosion is happening? Sometimes the root flares
"bulk up" so that the tops push above the soil line. That could look
like erosion.

I concur... leave it alone. Oak trees tend to be particularly sensitive
to
changes in depth of soil over the roots, as lots of people have found when
they regrade their yard and shove some soil next to the trees. 3-10 years
later, they get to have the tree removed.
http://www.mortonarb.org/research/treeroots.html
http://www.ipm.iastate.edu/ipm/hortn...1995/prot.html

Kay


Also, if the OP spots something that appears to be a disease, read, read,
read and read some more, before you bring in a tree "expert" who charges all
sorts of big money to stick vials of medicine into the tree. While young and
impressionable, my wife & I paid some huckster who said our 50 year old
sycamore had 6 months to live if he didn't do all sorts of treatments.
Turned the tree into a pincushion for a couple of weeks. The next season,
the tree was rid of the fungal thing, and two years after that, too. Then,
it came back. We read. Turns out sycamores survive the illness just fine
without any help, thank you. Otherwise, Rochester NY would have dead
sycamores all over the place. All we had to do to help it a bit was to stop
using its diseased leaves as mulch all over the yard. No idea if it helped,
but the tree's still rockin' and rollin'.