"White stuff?" You mean the winter buds at the stem tips? Those are a normal part of the tree that should have been appearing every year since planting.

Otherwise your lawn looks very lush, the stuff you put between the rocks and the neck of the tree appears dark as though damp. So maybe you did in fact cause some rotting at the base - what does the bottom of the tree look like now?

Generally speaking, pines don't want a ton of water and they need good drainage to be happiest. The off-color of the green parts is not a good sign. My gut is that it got too much water/did not drain well.

Here are the photos of the trunk base. Does anything look off at the base ?
Could my mulching at the base and then covering the mulch with river rocks cause too much moisture ?
Watering wise I do not recall increasing it out of norm. The tree had been happy for last two years ?
We did receive good rain in August

Soil continues to look as though quite damp for some time. On a possibly related subject tree still looks to be planted too deeply even after the pulling back you have done - remove all that material around it all the way out to the grass until you start to see the level where the roots radiate out from the trunk.

where is the root flare .... lets find it ...

do you irrigate your lawn ... does this pine get wet every day ... im talking about the needles ..

what is your base soil type.. under the tree .. is it bad clay?? ... could we have a clay cauldron from the point of planting?? ... no or little drainage ....

i highly doubt your recent mulch and stone work had much of an impact ... think in tree time.. and whatever happened.. could have been a few years back ... things really dont happen all that fast with conifers .... its possible.. but not probable.. imo ...

ken

btw.. for purposes here on houzz... a pine is a tree and a conifer ... not really a shrub .. a common name that isnt really descriptive here ...

but no harm ... the conifer peeps are the tree peeps in these forums.. so no need to duplicate the post there ...

ken

I removed the mulch and rocks and took out some soil. The flare is now some exposed. There isn’t much clay in the bottom

i dont not see the root flare in the newer pix ...

this is what we are looking for: https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffcm&q=root+flare&iax=images&ia=images

and i dont like that the buried trunk bark looks degraded ...

did you plant this tree.. if so when.. were the roots badly circling a pot??

what is you native soil ... bad clay ... does it drain properly???

ken

Hi Ken i planted this tree over two years ago. It was happy until now. Here is photo from August. Our soil is clay type. The tree was all green until last month. The mulch caused sow bug. Could that be a reason. I do have grubs in laws.

Also i am seeing that despite some small branches looking greener the smaller branches are easily snapping off and are fully dried. Does that mean the tree is already dead ?

The life is in the buds and your very first pic shows what appears to be viable buds...at least a few.

tj

this is unvarnished.. so take it for what its worth ....

i suspect.. it was pot grown for too long.. that is had badly circling roots ... that the clay soil led to watering issues ... and that it is hit with lawn irrigation every day .. most pine dont like wet leaves ... [in the alternative.. it was field grown.. and the root mass butchered on potting for sale ...]

i also suspect.. that it is dying of not dead .. and even if a few buds do make it ... there will be so much other destruction that you really should NOT have it outside your gorgeous castle ... there is no reason to not wait until spring.. to see what happens .. but if anything i said above comes true.. just get it out of there ...

i might bet my shiny penny ... that at that point.. you might be able to grab it.. and simply lift it out of the clay hole ... due to root rot .. or whatever ...

time to divest ...

and i will spare you what most of us think of poodle trees.. lol .. but if you like them.. all the power to ya ...

ken

ps: imo.. sow bugs are irrelevant ...

Btw quick update the tree needles are drying up :( and the tree is browning up. I think the tree is already dead. Not sure if there will be any miracle in next spring