Dealing With Ball Moss On an Oak Tree

Are you worried that ball moss is taking over your trees?  Do you have a massive amount of dead branches? No worries. Ball moss is a non-parasitic plant that survives on other plants without damaging them.  

So, what about all those dead limbs on your tree?  There’s a reason for that. But first, a little info on ball moss. Ball moss is an epiphyte that develops in the air. It doesn’t take anything from any tree. The tree offers ball moss a place to hang out.  

Ball Moss and Dead Branches
Back to the dead branches. If you are certain ball moss is destroying your tree, you have lots of company.  If you carefully examine your tree, you’ll see that a significant amount of dead branches are located mostly on the tree’s interior.  

The branches on a tree’s interior thrive in the shade and typically don’t get enough sun to make enough food to live. Once a limb gets too unhealthy, the tree stops any more support of that limb and lets that branch die.  

This is a sort of self-pruning for the tree. Limbs the tree has marked for death are suitably referred to as sink. Ball moss grows in dim light and usually attach itself to the branches that get the lowest amount of sunlight.

Ball Moss on an Oak Tree
Let’s say you have an oak tree. What if you don’t like the way the ball moss makes your oak tree look even if it is harmless? There are a few ways to remove ball moss.

One technique that is quite a labor intensive is to take it off by hand from the live limbs being cautious not to eliminate too many leaves in the process. If this seems a bit much for you, you can always schedule the job with a York tree service company.

Also, removing the dead wood from the tree will get a pretty good amount of the ball moss out and enhance the look of the tree. Moreover, cautious tree pruning can let the sun in and diminish the existence of any more ball moss.