I think a lot of us would like to see a photo of the damage and a photo of where damage did not occur. About what percentage is left undamaged or what percentage is a straight shot of chewing w/o gaps between the chewing?

Dax

and try to figure out how to make the pix upright ... maybe turn your gizmo the other way ...

pic of the trunk at ground level also ...

one thing for sure.. ignore the nimrod you were talking to ... in regard to trees anyway ...

ken

Hope these pics help. The damage isn't all the way around the tree.

can we dig out the grass carefully and find out where the root flare is??? ... we are supposed to see it ...

roots are made for soil and dampness.. trunks are all air ... putting trunk in soil.. not good ...

see link

and while you are at it.. go 2 or three feet out.. and add mulch ...

to keep that nut with the weedwhip away from it ... and the mower guy ...

ken

https://www.google.com/search?q=root+flare&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=oCmDVYzlG4rCsAW7q4OoBA&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAQ&biw=864&bih=745&dpr=0.9

kind of looks like a weedwacker did it

Is it decided it is animal damage and not mechanical? Do voles eat the bark (above the ground) or under the soil? When rabbits almost girdled shrubs last winter I could see the tooth marks. I ask because in case the damage is mechanical it would involve another step: fire the yardman.

Yes, get rid of grass the way ken says. No mulch volcanos against trunk. So in case you ever invite any weedwackers into your yard they won't be as inclined to get near the trunk and flay it alive

Thanks everyone for all your help. Just to clarify, it isn't a weedwacker. I mow the lawn and do the trimming, and I'm very ginger around the trees. Plus, the tree was fine in the fall last year. The damage appeared only when the snow melted this spring, along with a bunch of dead grass around the trunk, which I neglected to mention originally. As for doing what Ken said, I appreciate the idea, but the tree flourished for years with grass at the base. Something definitely got to it over the winter.

Is there any trimming I should do to dead branches? I was told today by someone at a nursery that I could do a "skin graft." Is that a thing? It seems like the concensus is to just leave it alone and let the air at it.

One last question in addition to the ones above: there seems to be a large split up the trunk (see attached photo). Is this normal, or part of the tree healing? Sorry for the photo being sideways. I'm not really sure why it's doing that.

Sunscald is the reason for that large split.

Dax

One point of minor disagreement with my friend Dax regarding planting depth: While this tree-a species adapted to high water tables-is doing well despite our inability to view root flare-that area of swollen tissue where trunk meets roots-it is undeniably planted too deeply. There is no flare at all apparent, and that's a mistake. The down side of a too-deep planting manifests only very slowly over years. And wetland species like this maple (red? Freeman? silver?-can't tell from pics) is of a type that can actually handle being buried too deeply better than an upland species like say, its cousin, the sugar maple. So it's adapted to occasional flooding and siltation caused by flooding and as such, may be less susceptible to the range of problems caused by this burial, but it is still planted too deeply.

+oM

i must have missed the 10 years ...

but i would still want to know where the flare is.. and i would still want the mulch ring ...

ken

+oM I think it's tough to gauge. All your points are valid about "slowness"/"time" for a tree that was buried too deep, but I look around my own landscape and there are tree after tree that show no root flare. And further into city plantings along streets, mature trees with 1' + caliper have no roots to be seen.

I think we both can be right or wrong.

Dax

The damage looks mechanical to me and not enough to cause the lack of leaves.
I notice your lawn has no broadleaved weeds. Have you used a weed killer on the lawn? Another reason not to stick a tree out in the middle of the grass.
Mike

I would say-differing tree species exhibit differing levels of sensitivity to improper planting depth. Floodplain species are the most tolerant, again because they've had to adapt to two conditions which mimic being planted too deeply-flooding and deposition of sediment following flooding.

+oM

Yup, it's called advantageous rooting.
Floodplain trees generally have thinner bark too. Less fires on a floodplain.
Sub-alpine trees have thinner bark for the same reason.
Mike