Question
Last year I planted three young Sweet Gum trees.  I live in Weatherford Texas which is 30 miles west of Ft. Worth.  We had a very rainy spring which left the trees very green, full and lush.  I was gone on vacation during a dry 3 week period and the trees did not get a regular watering.  I came home to the trees with brown leaves and one has died.  I noticed two huge wasp nests in the tree that died and one in a tree that is looking like it may survive (some new green leaves are emerging).  I am wondering if the wasps have anything to do with the tree dying?  I've removed the wasp nests but I am worried that I will loose the tree.  With the large amount of rain we received, I really felt the trees would be ok without a regular watering for a few weeks.  Did I make a huge mistake?

Answer
The wasps did not kill the tree. They just found a good place to build a nest. The tree roots grew shallow during the wet weather and then when the weather was dry for 3 weeks they were not deep enough to get enough water. Hardwoods can put on new leaves and sweet gum is pretty good at this. If you ahve not done this mulch around the trees with not more than 3 inches of mulch. This will help hold the moisture.

You can check to see if the tree is still alive by starting near the end of a branch and scrape a small bit of bark off and if the color under the bark is green the branch is still alive and should put on new leaves. If the color is brown the branch is dead at this point on the branch --continue down the branch scraping at interval until you find green under the bark. If you find no green check other branches and if no green then this tree is dead. You can prune the dead parts off and the tree should put new leaves on but this maybe next spring since it is late in the year and this close to fall.