Leader in trouble

The amazing leader #38 has lost over half of its volume over the last four weeks.

#38 on August 14, 2016

#38 on September 11, 2016

The signs of damage can be seen on the August picture but the spread of the disease dramatically picked up in the last two weeks. The change from last week to this was the top of the tree started to get damage as well:

Brown spots on top of #38, September 11, 0216

I have started spraying this and other trees with Dakonil 4 days ago. The reason I wasn't not spraying them before was the ready-to-spray containers were too expensive to put on a larger tree like this. I also did not experience a larger tree to get damaged so severely over a relatively short period of time. Now I purchased vast quantity of Dakonil in concentrated from Amazon for $14 for 16 oz, which is enough for 64 gallons of diluted spray. Interestingly, Sequoia is listed in the included booklet as one of the plants for which it is recommended.

Unfortunately, this may be too late for the leader. It loses needles on a scale that can be observed from one day to another. I am planning to spray it every other day or so. A minor positive news is that it continued to grow upwards, adding 0.5 of an inch for the past week.

The rest of the sequoias continued minor growth but the Fall is definitely knocking on the door. The night temperatures started going into the 50s. Day temperatures are still swinging pretty wild, from higher 80s to mid-60s.

One unexpected growth happened with #104. As a part of the acclamation to the new conditions it turned pale green-yellowish on the top after a few weeks after the move. The needles on top looked more like long curvy leaves. The density of these leaf-needles was much higher than normal growth. They looked like grass on top of the sequoia rather than normal looking branch and needles. The overall height also suffered because the top lead died. Then out of the middle of that "grass lawn" a very strong shoot started growing about third week of August. By September 3 it gained almost 5 inches and then after another week it added another 3.

April 28.25

31.5

31.5

32

32

33

Aug 14 31.5

Sept 3 36.25

Sept  11 39.5

#104 with a strong lead late in growing seasons on Sept 11, 2016

The rest of the strong samples added about half of an inch and weaker ones stayed at the same height as last week.

Also, I have now started tracking a few strongest 2016 seedlings.  #264 sample that was moved early in the season currently stands at 9.5 inches. The rest are between 3 and 7 inches.

#264 Strongest 2016 seedling on September 11, 2016