Bald Cypress Knees in Lawn

Jim Wyatt said:
Cypress are native to Virginia.
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Yes, their original northern coastal range extended to the southeast corner of Virginia. Down there in the Newport News area... which I only remember the name of because I saw the movie. I'm no geography expert, or even a Civil War era buff, but I was thinking Nokesville was up near Manassas. I apologize if I'm in error about this, or if Nokesville has recently been moved further south.
 
D x D said:
I would let them grow, and dress them up like little elves or dwarfs...then I would give them names.
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TreeCo said:
And trolls.
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If mine ever grows knees, ankles, buttocks or any other unusual earthy protrusions, I will carve them to look like little internet trolls and name them after famous Old West gunslingers.
;)
 
swingdude said:
Oh my lol.....
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Wow, I see this is an old thread but... Wow. I go to forums of all types for different advice... I've never seen any groups this rude/disrespectful posters...
It's not trees vs perfect lawn. We bought our home with two Cypress trees already in the back yard. A few years later and the kids can't play there without breaking an ankle! And... The knees have pushed up concrete under our patio...
I love everything about the trees except the knees. I browsed here hoping for a solution other than chopping them down.
It sounds like no other viable option for me.
Any management solutions developed in the past couple years?!
 
TRex10 said:
Wow, I see this is an old thread but... Wow. I go to forums of all types for different advice... I've never seen any groups this rude/disrespectful posters...
It's not trees vs perfect lawn. We bought our home with two Cypress trees already in the back yard. A few years later and the kids can't play there without breaking an ankle! And... The knees have pushed up concrete under our patio...
I love everything about the trees except the knees. I browsed here hoping for a solution other than chopping them down.
It sounds like no other viable option for me.
Any management solutions developed in the past couple years?!
Click to expand...


As previously mentioned, create a mulch bed around the trees se that you will not trip on the knees. people on this site are protective of trees, hence the response to lowering the mower deck onto the roots. Its possible that the previous portions of this thread could have been handled better by all parties, but as it is over a year old there is not much use getting into all of that. A poorly draining site may also be an issue as @cerviarborist had mentioned. How well does this site drain in your yard? could some drainage be installed without damaging the root system if you are holding water?

Good luck, and most on this site are extremely helpful, feel free to check out some of the other threads if you need to restore your confidence in this site. Even the political threads are filled with mostly polite responses. (y)


As for the concrete on the patio, depending on the location of the patio would determine the best solution for that. It could be that the patio was just poorly placed, and if that is the case it could be a cause of stress to the trees as well.
 
TRex10 said:
It's not trees vs perfect lawn. ...the kids can't play there without breaking an ankle! And... The knees have pushed up concrete under our patio...
I love everything about the trees except the knees. I browsed here hoping for a solution other than chopping them down.
It sounds like no other viable option for me.
Click to expand...

In this case, it is likely trees vs. lawn. It is poor form to plant a tree as beautiful as a cypress, then hack it. @cerviarborist gave a solution - drain the ground. Obviously, it's not practical. You need to remove the tree (and possibly replant), or transition the impacted area to a natural and/or aesthetically-pleasing landscape feature. I really encourage you to stop casting around and get on with it. Knees are beautiful, cypress are beautiful, grass has a purpose and can be beautiful. And, btw, @swingdude is a cool guy who limits cussing to only half his posts - usually the ones where someone is doing something that a proper arborist would never support. We all value trees very much and hate seeing them being hacked for preventable reasons. Wish you success.
 
Welcome to the list, TRx10. Please don't get the wrong impression of these chaps. There is a wealth of experience and knowledge here. Our veteran members are really passionate about trees and can get sort of testy when a tree is threatened or criticized. Now, I spent a lot of years down there in East Texas, Beaumont/Houston area, and I am afraid there really is no easy answer to your problem. You cut out a cypress knee, you get a dozen more. Even taking the whole tree down doesn't always work; several more will pop up to replace it. They have an incredibly complex root system that is almost impossible to kill or dig up. The examples I can remember where folks dealt with them the best was where they planned around the tree and the knees creatively. We had a neighbor with a big one behind his patio and he had some knees come up through it like you did. He repaired the patio cement each time, leaving little round flowerbed holes around each knee and left room in them for the knees to get bigger. A royal pain in the arse, yes, but the effect was actually rather interesting. And there is no real effective alternative anyway. Complete eradication would involve completely digging up the patio deck and a huge excavation hunting for all the roots and baby knees forming under it. Also, take heed of what some of the guys already said about drainage. These trees put up knees depending on how wet the ground is. You see some really impressive knees in the swamps with the cypresses actually growing in deep standing water. And I agree with a previous poster that anyone with a cypress in his yard is a lucky fellow. In much of the same state you live in you can drive all day without even seeing a single tree.
 
TRex10 said:
Wow, I see this is an old thread but... Wow. I go to forums of all types for different advice... I've never seen any groups this rude/disrespectful posters...
It's not trees vs perfect lawn. We bought our home with two Cypress trees already in the back yard. A few years later and the kids can't play there without breaking an ankle! And... The knees have pushed up concrete under our patio...
I love everything about the trees except the knees. I browsed here hoping for a solution other than chopping them down.
It sounds like no other viable option for me.
Any management solutions developed in the past couple years?!
Click to expand...

@TRex10; Welcome to the TreeBuzz forum.

I don't consider any of the previous posters as being rude. They may be cracking jokes, in a hard-hitting guy humor kind of way, but I don't think they are rude. What they are is a bunch of no-nonsense straight shooters who tell it like it is, whether or not it is what someone wants to hear. These guys are so highly experienced it is hard to believe. This forum is generally intended for arborists, by arborists, and when they discuss issues with each other they don't tend to sugar-coat things. So when someone wanders into the forum who is what I would think of as a civilian, they are not used to the straightforward, honest style of speech or writing. A whole lot of very honest and valuable advice and knowledge has been shared in this thread, and I for one feel honored just to be permitted to be a part of this forum, and to learn so much from these folks. Take the jokes with a grain of salt, but respect the honest opinions of the veterans in this thread. I love these guys, man.

Tim
 
Thank you all!
This welcome has certainly turned my opinion around.
I'm so sad about these trees. They are huge and beautiful trees. It's not a low area.... I suspect it's more the fact they are very mature. It would take digging up the entire yard. The foul was planting them in the first place. Thank you all.
 
Jim Wyatt said:
I guess I could use the cypress lumber. BTW Cypress are native to Virginia. Unfortunately cypress, when cut down, produce multiple suckers. I usually deal with that with an unwanted tree by painting the stump or stub with a potent herbicide, Roundup or other such brush killer, full strength. Quite effective. I totally resent the high horse attitude of the forum members. I in my years have planted and nurtured tens of thousands of trees, over 70,000 in two years when I was in high school. I had a neighbor who brought in a certified arborist to consult about a storm damaged tree and gave him a mis-identification of the tree species and questionable advice. You guys have charlatans in your ranks. I am outta here. Thanks for your time.
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"70,000 trees in 2 years"

40 hours a week x 104 weeks = 4160 hours in 2 work years
70,000/4160=16.83 trees per hour
You must plant very fast! Plus, being in high school you must have had no free time.
 
TRex10 said:
Thank you all!
This welcome has certainly turned my opinion around.
I'm so sad about these trees. They are huge and beautiful trees. It's not a low area.... I suspect it's more the fact they are very mature. It would take digging up the entire yard. The foul was planting them in the first place. Thank you all.
Click to expand...
In upland, well-drained sites cypress can grow quite large and old without ever developing knees. As a simple low-tech diagnostic technique you might try digging a hole the same size as a 5 gallon bucket in that part of the yard. Fill the hole with water to the top and then start checking it at ten minute intervals to see how long it takes for the water to drain out of the hole. Even if your site is well elevated you might have an impermeable layer of compacted soil keeping water from percolating through, and keeping the soil around the trees wet enough to promote the growth of knees. Just having compacted soil might force the cypress to grow knees just to make better use of a shallow soil profile.
 
Damn fine tree, more adaptable to our alkalinity than they get credit for too. Adapt to compacted and crappy sites better than many a conifer as well. Rust mites are pretty much their biggest problem here.
 
When I've got consulting assignments with big development footprints relative to the size of the site and everybody wonders where the required trees will go, it's nice to be able to pull a rabbit out of a hat and use the footprint of the retention pond for planting. On top of that, during rainy seasons, those trees will transpire an awful lot of water out of that retention pond daily.
 
I was shocked at their drought tolerance. They're not exactly native to my area, but the one I planted on one of our properties had to endure 3 years of drought conditions, one of them quite bad. We had no water on the property, at the time, so we took a tank of water there and did what we could to keep the trees and shrubs alive. They were pretty much on their own, though. The bald cypress tree sent roots down to the bottom of the ditch alongside the road, where there was a lot more moisture, and it survived in grand form. It didn't grow very much those three years, but it has more than made up for it in the following years, which have been wetter than normal.

They are a beautiful tree, and I love the dappled shade they provide... I'm hoping to plant a couple more this year. They very rarely send up knees, growing in the midwest. The only one I've ever seen do that here, was planted on a golf course, alongside of a creek that was prone to flooding at various times of the year.
 
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