Hi. I purchased a home 2yrs ago with an established apple and avocado tree. Neither produced very much fruit last year and what did develope looked under developed. In looking at the landscape around the trees I notice both have landscaping fabric with mulch on top. I lifted a corner to take a closer look at the soil. It is very much like clay and though it best to remove the fabric and amend the soil. I started doing some digging and a few inchess down I found tree roots (feeders?) and a plastic landscape netting. What should I do? Should i be concerned about killing the trees if I dig up these roots or will the tree just send out some new ones? Thanks for your help...I have no experience in caring for fruit trees but want to learn.
What a mess. Digging near the trees will do more harm than good. If the lower layer landscape netting is coarse mesh and will readily allow nutrients to pass through, remove the mulch and top fabric, then put the mulch back or replace with fresh mulch. Regularly mulched soil will improve the overall situation eventually.
hmgilbert, welcome to the forum.
Larry gives good advice.
It would help people to answer if you told us generally where you live. Some pictures would also help a bunch. There may contain some obvious clues that people can recognize and answer easily.
People are less wont to try and exhaustively list their conjecture about all of the possible causes of one year of meager fruit production.
Hi hmgilbert,
I had the same thing in my house. PLastic sheeting just under mulch. I removed it, put mulch back and more, and I've been growing thornless blackberries there. It's slowly healing. Before, it was a systematic soil death vortex. Now it's becoming healthier and more productive.
John S
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