We recently had two nice trees die.

One was a weeping mulberry, the other a desert willow.

Both were very hardy in our region.

The desert willow died because our leachfield, which it was planted on,
failed, and it basically drowned.

The other, the weeping mulberry, was on sandy soil, but never was healthy.
We have another in the front yard, a MONSTER, that we have pruned so the
grandkids have a massive "fort" under the limbs. I would estimate shade
diameter (not right term) at nearly 20'.

Today, I pulled the dead smaller weeping mulberry. The roots were stubby.
I did not dig down to see if it hit a caliche shelf, being 103 here today.
The roots did not run off shallow rooted, though, as I would suspect if it
had hit a caliche shelf.

What would cause a tree to have roots that ended in nubs no further from the
trunk than one foot, including one huge one that would have been the tap
root?

Ideas appreciated.

We're going to plant a chaste tree, as they grow here very well, and have
lots of flowers.

Steve

On Jul 21, 3:07*pm, "Steve B" wrote:
We recently had two nice trees die.

One was a weeping mulberry, the other a desert willow.

Both were very hardy in our region.

The desert willow died because our leachfield, which it was planted on,
failed, and it basically drowned.

The other, the weeping mulberry, was on sandy soil, but never was healthy..
We have another in the front yard, a MONSTER, that we have pruned so the
grandkids have a massive "fort" under the limbs. *I would estimate shade
diameter (not right term) at nearly 20'.

Today, I pulled the dead smaller weeping mulberry. *The roots were stubby.
I did not dig down to see if it hit a caliche shelf, being 103 here today..
The roots did not run off shallow rooted, though, as I would suspect if it
had hit a caliche shelf.

What would cause a tree to have roots that ended in nubs no further from the
trunk than one foot, including one huge one that would have been the tap
root?

Ideas appreciated.

We're going to plant a chaste tree, as they grow here very well, and have
lots of flowers.

Steve

"Chaste" ! You mean the poor thing will never be allowed to have,
uh, YOU know!

HB