Gardening and Horticulture - Mossy trees?

We bought a place that has quite a few established trees. The only problem is that many of them look diseased. We have some lilacs, cherrys, apples, and rhodadendrons, that all have white, green, and black moss growing on them. None of them look healthy, although they are still producing blooms and fruit under these conditions. They aren't producing a lot, but some. Is there anything we can do to try and save these trees? Can we spray them with something? We have been here for two years now, and we lost one of these type of trees this year. Last year it was full of blooms, this year it's dead. I dont' want to lose anymore if we can help it. I would appreciate any help you might have!:) thanks!

Hi Kerry,

Not enough info here to really help with what is going on with your trees. I suspect that you are seeing lichen and algae as well as moss on your trees. Lichen and algae won't hurt your trees, but if you have trees that are dying that is something else. Lilac, cherry and apple need full sun to bloom. It could be that the surrounding trees have grown to the point of shading these out. Full sun is 6 hours or more. Pruning at the wrong time will also lead to fewer blossoms.

Can you take some pictures of what you see growing on the trees and post them? I'd be most interested to see what you describe as black moss. That could be something fungal and not a moss at all.

I wouldn't suggest spraying anything until you know what it is you are dealing with. You could make matters worse.

Newt

I think that it is probably fungal, but it has a "mossy" look. It's not just black, but white and green too. All the trees are in open sunny areas, and I know that the lilacs were planted quite a few years back, yet aren't very big. The one small one that is left, is probably 4 ft. tall, and that's it. It's supposed to be one of the big ones. I waited until they were done blooming this year (only a couple of blooms), then pruned back some of the bad limbs, so I would have to take a picture of one of the other bigger trees, to show you what it looked like. I will do that. It may take a while to get it on here, since I haven't figured out how to post a pic yet.:D Thanks!

Kerri, consider posting your pics at a site like http://smugmug.com/ or http://photobucket.com/ where they have a 30 day free trial.

Newt