Hi, I had a honey locust planted last fall. I noticed after the excess rain a couple of weeks ago that some leaves turned yellow. It looks like they are now turning brown. What can I do?

Thank you for reaching out and sharing the pictures.

If there has been excess rainfall, the excess water can suffocate your young tree’s roots, causing a condition known as root anoxia or waterlogging. As your honey locust was planted last fall, its root system is still small, fragile, and highly vulnerable to saturated soil.

When the ground stays muddy for weeks, oxygen is pushed out of the soil pores, causing the roots to literally drown and stop absorbing nutrients, which forces the leaves to turn yellow, then crisp and brown.

A few things you can do:

• Assuming the soil is wet due to the rain. Stop all supplementary watering, until the soil dries out completely.

• If you have mulch around the tree, clear the wet mulch, pull the mulch 3-4 inches away from the trunk flare to allow the base of the tree and upper roots to breathe.

• Check the planting depth to ensure the tree wasn’t planted too deep last fall; the flare where the trunk widens into roots must be visible at the soil surface.

• Avoid adding any fertilizers or iron chelate, as overloading compromised roots with nutrients right now will burn them.

• Check the soil drainage by digging a small hole 6 inches deep nearby to see if water pools inside, it it does, the soil is severely compacted and holding water like a bowl. If that's the case, you may consider to amend soil compaction. Here are some info about soil compaction https://extension.umn.edu/soil-management-and-health/soil-compaction

Once the soil dries out completely, honey locusts are remarkably resilient and should begin growing healthy new green leaves. However, if the soil stays saturated for too long, the roots may rot, which leads to permanent wilting, twig dieback, or bark peeling at the base.

Hope it helps.