Anyone use it?

I saw this 1 online:

https://elmoreroots.com/collections/plant-care-materials/products/organic-tree-paint

22 bucks buys a bag that makes one quart. Bargain!

one wonders how the tree species survived before we started painting them....

Modern Snake Oil! When I was a kid, folks used to paint the trunks of Maple trees with white wash to keep the carpenter ants off..

Tree trunks are painted white when freshly planted to keep the tender south side of the trunks from getting sun scald.

well 95% of them didn't exist before human cultivation, because most are now dwarf root stock with at least one splice

Sun scald can be a problem I hear

I remember my great grandfather, who was a farmer most of his life before getting a factory job in his later years.... whitewashed his tree trunks every year. They were mostly white ash trees. I don't guess I ever knew why, or if I did, I forget.

I haven't seen anyone use it

Back in the seventies, lots of trees, large rocks in yards, fences and other stationary items, like well pumps and brass faucets, were white washed, probably just for aesthetic reasons. I remember thinking that it was strange that pretty pink granite rocks and red brick, garden walls were painted white.

Keith

we painted fruit tree, to keep rabbits and mice from eating trees

Here's my Dad, in the 1920s.
Notice trees to.right of pic.

Grandpa was STILL painting them 50 years later...

Pretty much all the young orchards here. Particularly the susceptible stock like peaches cherries etc

I haven't ruled it out. There probably is a time & place for it. Perhaps my new peach tree & persimmons could use the treatment

Yup, common when I was coming up. You forgot tires, the cut tire planters that every older lady had in the yard.

I think it was a mis-guided fad from the 60's (or likely, EARLIER).

my vague recollection is that it originated mainly among German immigrants.

but don't quote me on that.

That would make sense because in the areas I saw all the white washed objects when I was a kid, almost everybody was of majority German descent.

Keith

Blame it on the Germs.

of which I'm half

Many areas of Ohio are full of people of German descent. The DNA test I took says I'm 27% German, which matches well with the people in my pedigree.

Keith

Maybe orchard owners do it but I've never heard of a regular private landowner doing it