Getting Rid of Gum Balls

Anecdotal "evidence" from your friend cannot be researched.

Snipper works well, but has to be timed perfectly for good results.

Jeff, I'm just busting your balls, no need to get defensive. Copper rods sound too much like filling cavities with concrete.

SZ
 
Sorry Jeff, thought you were prescribing murder. Copper nails are reputed to kill trees. No idea what the real story of, but the anecdotal evidence would be of great interest. Assuming your friend (wh?) has his experience better than most of mine, that might be very interesting!

Blinky I agree; this is a tightassed adult with an overactive fear of liability issue, all the way. Don't trust anybody over 30!

uh wait scratch that...
 
Thanks for all the feedback thus far! Basically, it sounds like there are no great chemical options... It sounds like Florel and Snipper both have some small amount of success, but only if applied perfectly.

@ Jeff: That is interesting re: the copper rods. I would be interested to hear more about how this experiment went.
 
Actually, maybe I spoke to soon. I just did some research on Snipper and it looks somewhat promising.... There is a decent amount of buzz on the web about the success of this product.

@ easyphloem: how often have you used this product? what was the success rate? Was the reduction in gum ball production significant?
 
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I also have issues with gum balls and am happy to report that I was told at the U of North Carolina Arboretum that they have a fruitless Sweet Gum. It has everything we like about the tree but no balls.

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I believe this is what you are referring to (I pulled this info form WVU extension services):

"...there is a cultivar of sweetgum, Liquidambar styraciflua “Rotundiloba,” that is fruitless. It was discovered in 1930 near Pinehurst, North Carolina. While several of these have been planted at Missouri Botanical Garden, this plant is generally considered hardy only to Zone 6."

link: http://www.wvu.edu/~agexten/hortcult/treeshru/sweetgumballcontrol.pdf
 
How long does it take those copper nails to kill a tree? I put a hundred or so into a huge live oak in my back yard and it is thriving. It's been 18 years and I see no ill effects. Has anyone ever actually killed a tree with copper nails?
 
I got the copper idea from a carpenter. Could be another myth.

Arborists come in different shapes and sizes but I don't put any nails in trees, don't use resistographs or bolts, and think trunk injections are a joke. Basically I don't do anything invasive to trees unless I'm killing them.

Stress often causes more fruit production. Trees do this in an effort to survive or reproduce when they're dying. Perhaps back to the basics, water when needed, avoid soil compaction, and clean up the fruit. Even hire a climber to knock the fruit down before it falls. Wish I knew what a gumball was. Mine come from a machine.
 
Boreality Sweet gum trees fruit alot of people call them gumballs. I just rake them up for our clients. Now try Walnuts for a fruit, anything that makes a thud when it hits the ground can give you a hurtin. In the fall the kids and I take our older lacrosse sticks and toss them out in the field and see if any come up the next year. So far 10 small trees and fat hawks that wait till the squirels go after them, and the neighbors have some new trees growing too ( gotta love rodents with c.r.s.)
 
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I don't put any nails in trees, don't use resistographs or bolts, and think trunk injections are a joke.

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So I take it you have never installed a lightning protection system, cables, nor braces?

Regarding trunk injections, I think there is a good argument to be made for trunk injections since they involve no run off, no drift, no leaching - they basically have zero impact on the surrounding environment. That's certainly a huge bonus for the environment. And research shows they have minimal (if any) impact on the tree. Anyways, I suppose this is a conversation for another thread...

I do not think the client would be very pleased with us putting nails in his gum trees, if for no other reason because I would have no way to scientifically explain the reasoning behind it. Instead, I think I'll give Snipper a try. It looks promising.
 
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Side note: if copper nails kill trees, why don't lightning protection systems kill trees?

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Finally! Someone! Thank you! Jeeze.
 
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Actually, maybe I spoke to soon. I just did some research on Snipper and it looks somewhat promising.... There is a decent amount of buzz on the web about the success of this product.

@ easyphloem: how often have you used this product? what was the success rate? Was the reduction in gum ball production significant?

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Works for reducing Ginkgo fruit too. You just need to get the product in when the flower buds are almost fully mature. Within a couple of years of treatment, reductions of 50% are not out of the ordinary. I don't like the cost/benefit of this product, and therefore rarely prescribe it.

SZ
 
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Side note: if copper nails kill trees, why don't lightning protection systems kill trees?

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Finally! Someone! Thank you! Jeeze.

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I never said copper nails kill trees, just don't believe they would stop a sweetgum from fruiting.
SZ
 
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Stress often causes more fruit production. Trees do this in an effort to survive or reproduce when they're dying. Perhaps back to the basics, water when needed, avoid soil compaction, and clean up the fruit. Even hire a climber to knock the fruit down before it falls. Wish I knew what a gumball was. Mine come from a machine.

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Just saw what these looked like this winter Boreality. Spiky balls, and defintely more horrifying to adults than kids. All it takes is mushy crab apples up here in Calgary to get adults up in arms. People just need to get over it.

No idea about copper rods really do but I bet KT Smith would have something very well-informed to teach us all. Perhaps we should ask him.

It's true that some trees reproduce more when stressed and dying. Other trees it may be the opposite, investing energy in their strongest parts and abandoning and walling off the weak parts. Or suckering. It depends on how they 'decide' to use their energy budget when threatened.

Americans go and bomb nations when infidels threaten. Others might try and negotiate or go through the courts. And yet others might build a wall around their city.
Like people, trees have different defense strategies, only more sensible.
grin.gif
 
You can poison something without killing it. Copper ions in concentration ARE poisonous to pretty much all forms of life. That's a biological fact.

It's like saying spikes kill trees... no, not usually, but they can. Wounding is wounding. Wounding with copper is worse than wounding with stainless... significantly worse.

I have no idea why copper nails are used on lightning protection, it seemed wrong to me last time I installed one.
 
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