Finding strips of bark under your tree is unsettling, but a tree losing bark is not always a tree in trouble. Some common Evansville yard trees — sycamores, river birches, shagbark hickories — shed bark as a normal part of growing. Others lose bark because something is genuinely wrong: sunscald, fungal cankers, boring insects, or frost cracks. The bark itself usually tells you which story it is.
Start with two questions. First, what species is it? Second, what does the wood underneath the shed bark look like? Healthy new bark or smooth wood beneath is reassuring. Dark, dead, or crumbling tissue underneath is not.
Some trees grow faster than their outer bark can stretch, so they peel and flake as a matter of routine:
On these trees, shed bark comes off in patterns, the trunk underneath looks alive, and the canopy stays full. No action is needed.
Even smooth-barked trees can slough small patches in a hot, fast-growing season, and minor flaking after a wet spring is common. Normal shedding stays superficial — the layer beneath is intact bark or healthy tissue, not bare dead wood spreading across the trunk.
Young, thin-barked trees — maples are the classic Indiana example — can be injured when winter sun warms the southwest side of the trunk by day and temperatures crash after sunset. The damaged tissue dies, and months later the bark over it loosens and falls away, usually in a vertical patch on the sun-exposed side. The tree often survives, but the dead patch is an open door for insects and decay.
A related injury: on very cold nights, the trunk’s outer wood contracts faster than the interior and splits with an audible crack, leaving a long vertical seam. Frost cracks often partially close in summer and reopen in winter, and repeated opening can let in decay organisms. A crack that stays clean and gradually rolls new wood over its edges is healing; a crack surrounded by soft, dark bark is not.
Fungal and bacterial cankers kill defined patches of bark and the cambium beneath. The surface looks sunken or discolored, then cracks and separates from the surrounding healthy bark, which may form a callus ridge trying to wall the infection off. Cankers that expand year over year, or that appear in several places at once, belong on the worry list — our guide to the signs your tree is diseased covers how cankers fit into the bigger symptom picture.
When bark loosens in patches and you find sawdust-like residue, winding tunnels, or small exit holes underneath, insects have been feeding in the layer between bark and wood. The bark detaches because the tissue holding it died. Ash trees with flaking bark and woodpecker damage deserve particular suspicion in Indiana, given emerald ash borer pressure.
Bark over decayed wood often sounds hollow when knocked and eventually collapses inward. Bark stripped by mowers, string trimmers, vehicle bumps, or deer rubbing is a different pattern — a wound at a consistent height with an obvious external cause. Even “simple” wounds matter, because exposed wood is where decay starts.
Do not peel loose bark off to “check” — you will tear living tissue at the edges and enlarge the wound. Do not paint or seal the bare area; modern tree care guidance generally leaves wounds unsealed so the tree can close them naturally. Keep mulch pulled a few inches back from the trunk so the base stays dry and visible, and protect young thin-barked trees from mower bumps, which cause more trunk wounds than any disease. Beyond that, bark loss with dead tissue underneath is a diagnosis question, and a tree professional can assess how deep the problem runs and whether the area is stable or advancing. If the assessment suggests the tree’s health is failing more broadly, it helps to know when a situation calls for a tree professional rather than watchful waiting.
Will bark grow back on my tree? Trees do not regenerate bark the way skin heals. Instead, healthy tissue at the wound’s edges produces callus wood that gradually rolls inward and can eventually close small wounds completely. Large areas of dead bark, or wounds circling much of the trunk, may never fully close, which is why the size and location of bark loss matter more than the simple fact of it.
My sycamore drops bark every summer. Should I worry? Almost certainly not. Sycamores shed bark in patches as normal growth — the trunk expands faster than the rigid outer bark, which flakes off to reveal mottled new bark beneath. As long as the canopy is full, the exposed bark looks pale and healthy rather than black and dead, and no mushrooms or dieback accompany it, you are watching a healthy tree do what sycamores do.
Can sunscald kill a tree? A single sunscald patch rarely kills an otherwise vigorous tree, but it creates a lasting weak point. The dead section cannot move water and nutrients, and it invites borers and canker fungi into exactly the wrong place. Young maples and other thin-barked trees planted in open, sunny spots are most at risk. Wrapping young trunks for their first winters is a reasonable preventive step for susceptible species.
What does it mean if bark is falling off and the wood underneath is black? Black, soft, or crumbly wood under detached bark means the tissue there is dead and likely decaying. Combined with mushrooms, oozing, or crown dieback, it points to an established internal problem rather than a surface issue. A tree in that condition deserves a professional assessment, because the same decay that kills bark can quietly weaken the trunk’s load-bearing structure over time.
Should I remove the loose bark hanging from my tree? Only pieces that are already fully detached and come away with no resistance. Cutting or prying at bark that is still attached tears into the living edge the tree is using to close the wound. If a large flap is hanging by living tissue, leave it; if in doubt, have it evaluated rather than experimenting on the trunk of a mature tree.
The difference between normal shedding and a dying trunk can be a few inches of dead tissue — easy to miss if you do not know the patterns. Call (844) 542-2293 to request service, and a tree professional can assess what is happening under your tree’s bark and what, if anything, needs to be done about it.