Would you tell us where on this earth you live, please? And closest city name.

You can add that info permanently to your name & it will always show up

Thanks! Climate is important to identifying factors that affect plant health.

I've added the city. Thanks Marie.

NEVER use a tree spike again.. EVER.. useless.. waste onf money..

any chance at a before pic??.. im wondering if the haircut was so intense.. that now that all of that stuff is gone.. the stuff under.. was not hardened off to heavy june midwest sun.. and is now sunburning...

dont leave the drain pipe under this tree... at least during heavy rain..

take a hand trowel.. and insure there is moisture down 3 to 6 inches.. where this trees roots are.. water more if need be..

your plant is stressed .. fert is NEVER an answer to stress...

perhaps we can see more.. with some closer pix...

tree time is counted in decades.. fert applied 4 weeks ago is not doing this... i rule that out totally.. but i would still tell you to go dig up the spikes.. and throw them away... or if you have a compost pile.. break them up.. and throw them in the pile for next year...

ken

@ken_adrian the last picture is what it looked like after the cut. I'll post here again. I tried looking for the 3 fert spikes to pull them up, the rocks are in my way.  I'll try again. I'll move the drain when we get heavy rain, it's been heavy rain this week and more expected so moving it now. I checked for misture and was satisfied but I need to go deeper as you suggested. It does look like the sun has burned it but it has never happened before. I guess the big chop stressed it. I'm wondering how far this brown is going to spread. I just hope it's not dieing. I love this tree.