Tree Just got hit by lightening

Any tree experts out there? Is this tree history?

When we moved in 15 years ago it was covered with thick ivy. You could not see the bark of the trunk. We cut a band around the ivy and saved it, hope i can save it again.

 

Wow! Glad it didn’t hit your house.

I have no idea if it will be OK.

 

Everytime that has happened to mine or a neighbors, the tree has died. I would say the tree is toast. Sucks especially if it is a big nice one such as that one.

 

How deep did it penetrate? As long as there's a bunch of area remaining around the circumference, it'll live. As long as it's not so deep as to be weak, it'll stand. From what I can see in your photo, I think it looks good to survive.

 

Yeah it scared the bejesus out of me, and the necrotic dog I was talking about last night.

Had lightening hit our house years ago, took out the condenser unit of our AC. My Dad and I pulled the thing out, found the hole in the coil, right on a ujoint. Cleaned it up, put a new one on, charged up the system and it worked. Really got our geek on. Then I looked at him and was like..."you know i could have gotten a new AC out of this!"

 

It went through the tree. That bark is blown off on both sides. Hit a dead dogwood tree next to it, it was on my list to cut down anyway. This big thing...

 

It’s probably not gonna make it, you will know in a few days or might take just a little longer. Dam thats a hard hit! Lightning is tough on trees. It likely saved your home.

 

Your weather is headed right for us. I don’t mind rain just not all at once.

 

I didn't mention our roof leaked also. Came down hard!

 

Did it scare you?
Your best bet is to call an arborist. We have some friends whose oak got struck, blew a big hole about five feet up in the trunk. The arborist put some support on the branches to relieve the stress on the damaged area. If I remember correctly, he said it would last a long time, but not as long as it would have without the damage.

 

I was in the dinning room, maybe 45 feet away in the house. uh...yeah. got my attention. I knew it hit close but no idea it was that close.

 

I'd be putting my shorts in the washer right now.

 

I would get in touch with a arborist (tree doctor) I would suspect you would have to wrap the bark till it heals for a bit. Just my 2%

 

And here comes another cell...

 

I have had several of my trees struck by lightning . Haven't lost one of them. A tree got struck on the property behind my place, blew bark over 200 feet. Split the tree in half from the split to the ground some 30 feet. That one died

 

Only time will tell if your tree will live on. Glad y'all are safe.

 

That tree is toast. The split is the result of instant boiling and expansion of the moisture in the tree. Looks like an oak so should be great firewood in a year. But I have only seen three or four like that. One happened when I was sitting on the front porch watching the storm with a friend. The tree died within a year.

 

Tree is done. Had a similar situation as yours with the same check split down the stern, but additionally ALL the bark blew off the entire tree which happened to be biggest Oak in the neighborhood. It was a huge skinless tree from ground to top after the hit.

Will make good firewood.

 

Shame I don't have a fire place.

 

There should be local firewood people who may be willing to come cut it up and haul it off, and maybe pay something for it. Leaves of lower left tree look like red oak? Wait to make sure it is really dead and then look up firewood people. In heat of summer you should be able to verify soon it is dying.

 

It is sad to see big trees die, but that is part of life. We have lost huge pines and oaks to lightning and hurricanes. Most recent lightning strike we saw (a year or two ago) has made a great roost for Pileated woodpecker in a large dead pine.

 

Don't know enough about them to know if it's red or white oak. This one doesn't give me this much shade except in the yard. I got another actually in my yard that I would REALLY hate to lose.

 

Red oaks have pointed lobes on the leaves. The smaller branches on the second picture look like red oak. White oaks have very rounded edges of the leaves, no real sharp points of the border of the leaf. There may be tiny spines at certain spots along the leaves for a swamp/chestnut white oak, but on any red oak variety there will be acute angles of the borders/edges of the leaves. Either makes good firewood though. White oaks have sweeter acorns, although I suspect only deer and squirrels really know that.

 

these are the leaves of that tree

Red or White?

 

That sort of looks like a Post Oak which are very nice trees. Sorry to see such a big one hit by lightning. I am only an amateur tree fan ( and ferns and palms), so I very well could be off, but it looks to me more like a post oak than a white oak.

 

White (post oaks are in the white oak family)

 

And as I look at South Carolina tree sites, it looks more like the white oak than I thought originally. I see post oaks listed as quercus stellata; white oaks are quercus alba, traditionally. We in east Texas have a second “white oak” which is a swamp white oak, that I think is Quercus michauxii. Yours is not a swamp white oak. In any event, I am sad to see it split like that.

 

This rain keeps up it'll turn swamp. Guess I shouldn't complain, you guys out west are getting dumped on also.

I looked up the bark, it's clearly white oak.