These emerald green, green giants and golden have been growing here in front of my house for at least 17 years, very low maintenance plants. However, these last two months I started noticing the scattered dead twigs appearing in all varieties of them. I am trying to find out what is going on and how to respond. This does not look like cedar rust as there are no corresponding (creepy!) fungal growth bodies. I have dug a few 6" in diameter holes for support posts this year but they are 5 feet from any arborvitae. Don't think that is an issue.
On many of the arborvitae I use the just mentioned support poles to pull to support the arborvitae if they are learning or might lean w winter snow and I use 2" wide straps around the trunk for support, being careful not to apply too much pressure and careful NOT to wrap around and squeeze the entire trunk. Is this the cause of some of the live twigs dying? I do not think so because even the arborvitae which have no support are experiencing this scattered twig die off.
I did lightly trim some of the arborvitae with shears this year for the first time, but even the ones that I did not trim are showing the scattered twig die off. So not that. Not seeing any bugs or bug cocoons....
Thank you for any and all input!
