Thread: Article on growing my Red Cedar.

how do you go with teh trees?

do you have them planted a long way apart to stop tip moth?

how old are they?

Virtually all my trees are natural regeneration and it is quite thick in places. The tip moth borer is a problem but it seems to grow out of it eventually. The RC does best on the moist fertile alluvial gully flats and much more slowly on the thin soil and dry slopes. My oldest tree I would guess to be about 100 years old but it isn't a tree in the photos. It has grown beside some rainforest which has given it some competition to slow it down a bit. Bob

we have quite a bit of red cedar around teh house nd down teh back.

teh ones around the house are well over 40 years old. all dead or dying now from tip moth.

just milled one. 400mm diamiter x 2.4m trunk nice dark timber. growing on top of a dry ridge.

the ones down teh gully are 800mm diamiter plus with good 15m trunks. growing out of rainforest. there is about 12 like that. all now being attacked by tip moth. will be dead withing a few years.

I very much doubt that the problem is tip moth borer. I suspect that the problem is dry weather and this spring has been very dry. I believe that it is this dry weather that can kill the whole tree or more commonly parts of the crown.The tip moth borer will only attack branches up to about an inch or two in diameter and I believe in smaller trees. Drought is a very serious problem because these dead branches will slow the growth but more importantly the tree will have to cast off the dead branches and then have to grow over the wound. This is then a problem because if the tree's growth is not fast enough, it becomes an entry point for decay which can enter the tree and rot out out the centre of the tree.
RC is a tree that has the ability to invade cleared areas and can in some conditions be a common tree. Some people say that these open grown trees in difficult conditions have the best colour but I'm not so sure. Bob

this is tip moth. killing the branches from the top down then they shoot out and these branches dye. after about 4 years of this never ending assault it kills the tree.

ill take some pics tomorrow.

the trees near the house are growing in the open on stony dry ridge. nice rich dark red but short trunks that branch quickly.