Assessing Cold Damage in Lychee and Avocado Trees

The Scratch Test: Reading Bark Color

Scratching the bark reveals the cambium layer – green means living tissue, brown indicates dead. Your lychee shows brown under the bark but a whitish-green center in a clipped branch, suggesting it's on the cusp – not clearly dead, not clearly alive.

Lychee: Wait and Watch

Give it 2 more weeks. If no new growth appears, test branch flexibility – living branches bend; dead ones snap. The whitish-green center is encouraging but not definitive.

Avocado: Clearly Alive

Green cambium and potential new growth mean the avocado is fine. Do not fertilize yet. Wait until early April, then apply a balanced citrus fertilizer (about 1 cup) spread evenly from the drip line inward. Just irrigate normally until then.

Key Principle

Cold-stressed trees need time to compartmentalize damage and mobilize reserves. Fertilizing too early forces growth the damaged root system can't support.