kingsville boxwood help

yes... yet still another post regarding the harsh winter we in north america had...   

i am in wisconsin - zone 5B

i have (dont want to say "had" yet) a k-ville boxwood that is doing nothing since taking him out of winter storage...
at that time he had some brown leaves, but many were still green (as understand it, they are somewhat "evergreen" ?)

so now its a month or 2 later and there is more brown leaves and i dont see any new buds pushing...

it was over due for a repotting at the end of last year, so a few weeks ago i just slipped him out of the nursery pot without doing any root pruning and MINIMAL removal of soil around the edges... i then surrounded the root ball and nursery soil with loose bonsai soil in a "rescue pot" (just a big plastic colander for lots of extra drainage/air flow, etc), hit it with superthrive, no fertilizer, morning sun only, etc...

still no action...

branches still green under the bark when scratched...

i was thinking about just cutting back some of the brown to maybe encourage any dormant buds to pop further back and get some energy flowing... but not sure if this would further stress the tree or would just be flogging a dead horse.

any thoughts or other suggestions would be much appreciated.

thanks
kevin

if i get time i will put up a pic

Kingsville are very slow to wake after a harsh winter, I know mine is. I would practice patience and proper watering, and see what happens.

hey judy... if believing you is wrong, i don't wanna be right...   

thats the answer i wanna hear,
and i have enough trees to dote on that i can let him sit and rest and hopefully wake up.

i did take some pics, and maybe post 'em sooner than later in case anyone else has 2 cents to toss in,,,

thanks again, j
kevin

Hey Beer City..... I had a kingsville boxwood that suffered from this harsh winter it was pretty green coming out of winter but then the leaves started getting hard and brittle....Then the leaves just started to lose that green color. So you can pretty much guess what has happened to the tree at this point i was like you thinking maybe it was just slow due to harsh winter. Hopefully yours is a little slow and hasnt met the same fate as mine. I guess losing trees is a part of the learning experience. I have now since replaced my boxwood with another i purchased from Evergreen garden works im pretty satisfied with this tree.

yeah steve... what you described is EXACTLY what mine is doing...

did you give your bark a scratch to check for green before giving up on it ?

 Hey Beer yeah i actually did scratch the bark and at first it was still nice and green so i thought i still had hope. Then i would wait a week or so then try again but then started to notice the green wasnt as bright fading each time....Then i had your thought of mind to cut back branches hard thinking it would back bud but nope didnt do anything else so i finally had to come to terms with my loss..    

beer city is where i'm from
and snake is a tag that has been stuck since the mid 1970s

so, kevin is fine   

hey steve,,, wasnt looking at a "hard cutback" (like in surfing), but more like a trim of the dead stuff in case it was drawing any energy,,,
havent done it yet, but might if i hear some supporting opinions...

for now, i'm just letting her coast   

couple pics
(and no wise cracks about its first haircut... i know a lil bit more now    )
beautiful tree upon purchase:



one well sheltered winter in wisconsin   

Ha ha Kevin ok cool!

Kevin im sad to say my tree looked exactly like yours after the Sheltered photos you post there. Man that tree really had some potential too. I think hope maybe lost with this one as much as i dont want to say that. I hated when i took my tree to the local nursery to have them take a look they told me right off it was dead i didnt want to believe it!

well, steve i went ahead and cut off the obvious dead stuff, and i will be damned if i dont see what looks like some tiny new leaves...
only a few, and i'm still green under the bark, so she aint going on the funeral pyre just yet...

btw - i had a workshop with one of your fellow carolina-ers yesterday - arthur joura...
if you havent been to the carolina arboretum yet, you should make a point of doing so...

kevin

 Yes!! Thats good to hear Kevin! I got my fingers crossed for you even though im new to Bonsai Boxwoods are def one of my favorite trees so i really hope yours pulls through as it is so nice to me.

I def want to check out the arboretum This year hopefully within the next 2 months everyone keeps telling me i really should so i will make it a point to go check it out this year. Keep us posted on the Boxwood by the way

right on steve... i'm pretty new too (just a few years).

next will either be a pic of a recovered b-wood
or a pic of fire