white stuff on scots pine buds + needle drop

[damienw133]

Hi all,

Hopefully i'm being paranoid, but while i was in the garden today i noticed that quite a lot of the new buds on my dwarf scots pine seem to have some white resinous residue on them. As well as that i've also noticed it starting to drop some of the old interior needles over the last couple weeks, though i think the the new growth still looks decently healthy....

I still have to get some trees nearby cut down to let more light in as its definitely not getting as much sun as i'd like it to, but at the moment its getting around 3-4 hours of full sun a day + dappled sun for the rest of it, so i'm wondering whether its suffering a bit from too much shade?

Scots pines are a bit of a new field for me so i'm not quite sure what to expect from them....is this normal for them or do i need to undertake some life saving action on it?

Cheers!

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[shibui]

It has been a long time since I had Scots pine but I believe your questions are probably generic pine questions anyway.

Needle drop: Even though pines are evergreen the individual needles are only productive for 2-3 years. After that the tree discards them. Old needles usually drop in summer after the new ones have emerged so as long as you still have new and last year's needles all looking healthy the tree is fine.
That process happens to all pines with some minor changes to timing. It is the reason we need to prune to keep growth compact. Without new side buds to cut back to the branches get longer and longer with longer bare sections which does not look so good.

White stuff on buds: Resin on buds is common with some pine species. In fact it is a diagnostic feature used to differentiate European black pines from Japanese black pines.I am not certain about Scots pine but I think it is a natural thing. If it doesn't move and if it can't be squashed it is not a problem.

[Ryceman3]

Pretty much agree with what shibui has said above, I don't think I would be too worried.
I took a couple of shots of some Scots buds this morning for you to compare. One tree had some with resin deposits quite clearly, the other not so much. I remember last year I had one Scots with so much resin build up I was worried the buds couldn't push through it (they did) ... so it's not uncommon.
As for needle drop - see shibui's explanation above. If it's all older needles, then it is normal for this time of year.
Don't stress too much, it looks OK to me.
In other news ... do you have shares in an aluminium wire company?? That's a lot of wire!

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