Bottle Tree with Droopy Limbs and What To Do

Q. I have several bottle trees that have grown well over the last years and one that has always had a slight “droop” to the branches. I’m not sure what else to do as all the other trees are doing great!

When young, many trees have upright growth. It is very common in young trees. Remember, Kurrajong (aka Bottle tree in the US) can reach 55 feet tall!

A. If the tree otherwise looks healthy there may be nothing you can do about it. Growers of bottle trees usually start them from seed. Propagating plants directly from seed creates a lot of tree variability in their growth habit, flower color, seed pod as well as the seed itself. The result is that some trees are more upright than others, some have different leaf color, and some more resistant or susceptible to disease or insects. Its genetic and nothing much you can do about it.

Trees grown from seed can show quite a bit of genetic variability in their shape, leaf color, overall size, size of acorns, leaf size and other visible traits. That's not even counting what you cant see!

Other trees propagated from seed include southern live oak, and most of our pine trees. So, you see, this variability can be good, or it can be bad if you don’t like it’s looks or it’s more susceptible to a disease present in your locale.

If you are not careful in your watering, the canopy can drop leaves or maybe some limbs might sunburn and die.

When trees are young, they oftentimes grow more vertically. They want to get taller and get taller than any competitors nearby. As they get older, vertical limbs become more horizontal. It’s possible this is what you see. When it has a full canopy of leaves then horizontal limbs are not a problem. The dense canopy of leaves shade these thin-barked horizontal branches. But if there is leaf drop from disease, insects, drought or normal leaf drop then watch for sunburn on these very susceptible limbs.

Because they are native trees, they don’t need a lot of fertilizer. Native plants are like that. They are not commercial hybrids that rely on more soil nutrients applied by fertilizer. This means applying a light application of high nitrogen fertilizer like 16-16-16 or 20-20-20 once a year in the spring just after new growth starts is enough.