I accidentally defoliated my four year old lychee tree!

[chrobrego]

Part of my winter freeze protection is to fill a 5 gallon black colored bucket with water, cover it with a top and leave it at the base of the fruit tress for nighttime warmth. Well, I just noticed I left a bucket still out under my hak-ip tree. The water was pretty hot since our spring Florida heat is here, but I didn't think about it and dumped the water close to the base of the tree. Two days later I noticed that the leaves were all dried out. It isn't lacking irrigation, so I'm at a loss.  Do you think that bucket of water killed the tree?  Man, I hope it flushes back out. What a stupid mistake on my part.

[knlim000]

scratch the lower part of the trunk, if you see green, it is still alive and good.

[xmario]

I doubt you completely killed the tree so quickly with the warm-hot water, he is most likely in a shock, but only time will tell ...for now you have to close your eyes and wait for the new flush of leaves in a month or two, if nothing happens for the next 3-4 months then start thinking seriously about a loss.

[Triloba Tracker]

This reminds me of a similar bone-headed move i made a couple years ago.

I was planting several Asimina triloba trees on a hot, sunny day and watering them in with a black garden hose.

As the day wore on i failed to realize the water coming out of that hose was blazing-hot (not that i didn't know this would happen, I just didn't think about it in the throes of planting lots of trees).

Once i realized it, I was sure i'd fried my trees. But they are all still alive 2 years later and seem not to have missed a beat.

[Tropheus76]

I doubt that would have made a difference. The water would be spread out and would be cooling as soon as it hit the soil. Its not like it was boiling. I use my hose some times and have the hot water on trees quite a bit by mistake and never notice a difference.