distressed red oak

[dmcarr4]

A red oak in my front yard (West side) is showing signs of distress on its leaves. The leaves are turning brown around the edges, but only on the lower branches. We have been given two different opinions, but don't know which to believe, if either. The first person's opinion is that the tree needs iron and they want to charge us a fee to treat it. We're a little skeptical of this because another red oak only twenty feet away shows none of these signs. The second opinion is that our sprinkler system is hitting the lower branches thus causing the leaves to scorch in the hot West Texas sun. Their suggestion was to trim the tree higher and adjust our sprinklers. This seems believable, but too simple. If anyone has some insight to our problem, please let us know.

 

[treeclimber165]

If you are running your sprinklers in the heat of the day, I would believe the second opinion.
I won't bother going through the reasons why we shouldn't water in the middle of the day in hot climates. They are posted everywhere from the back of your water bill to the pamphlets in the local garden center. If you are not watering between 9AM and 5PM then it is probably something else. Hard to say without looking at all the parameters.

 

[John Paul McMillin]

here in delaware we have a severe problem with bacterial leaf scorch on red and pin oaks. usually shows up in august and the outer edge of the leaf turns brown then a yellow halo around the green center . I dont know if you have it in texas , but get a certified arborist look at it or send a sample to your local extention agent at the univerisity. Are you in a drought ? If your pH of the soil is high then oaks cant get the iron they need , but it would show up on the entire tree and it would look more yellow all over and not just brown on the lower limbs. How big is the tree? john