Arborvitae Browning

As you have seen, or will be seeing shortly, Arborvitae has taken a huge hit this winter.  We had numerous days were the ambient temperature was well above freezing and the needles did not stay dormant.  There is a tremendous amount of winter desiccation.

Management options:

1.  Start watering the trees now until the spring rains kick in.
2. Prune out anything that has not greened up by the second week in May.
3. If these are high valued trees, spraying with a cooper based fungicide in Mid May and Mid June may help keep phemopsis tip blight and other fungi at bay.

That is really about the only recommendations.  I suspect we will lose many, so be prepared.  I have fielded 41 emails today on this topic.  Take care.