<p>We’ve not a live tree in years but this year we got one. In the past, we’ve always had luck with re-cutting the stump right before putting it in the stand/water. This year, no such luck. This tree is soaking up no water and is starting to dry out!</p>
<p>My idea is to take most of the water out (that will be fun…), drill a few holes into the stump and then put the water back in to cover up the newly drilled holes. My idea is that the tree will be able to soak up water that way.</p>
<p>What do you think? Will this work or are we going to have take off all the lights/decorations and just re-cut the bottom of the stump again?</p>
<p>My tree isn’t taking up water, either. We bought it late, so I think it took up all the water it was going to after cutting.
Christmas is only five days away. I’m going to just let it do it’s thing and if it’s a bit dry, so be it. Taking the ornaments off and trying to get it to take water is a lot of trouble for very little gain, imo. You could mist it a few times a day- it will take in some water through the needles. Otherwise, it may be a bit dry, but I bet it smells great!</p>
<p>It is possible that the base of the tree (where it was cut) sapped over betweeen the time it was cut and the time it was put in water. They generally recommend not leaving the tree out of water for more than 10 or 15 minutes to prevent it from sapping over.</p>
<p>If it has sapped over, the way to fix it is to cut off 1/4 of an inch of the base of the tree with a saw and resubmerge it into the water. 100% of the water is soaked up by the cabmium layer, which runs around the circumference of the tree. Drilling holes in the tree does not open up enough surface area of the cabmium layer to effectively allow it to drink water.</p>
<p>You can recut the stump without taking off the decorations. Once I recut the stump of a tree that was 16.5 feet tall, and probably weighed 200 pounds. We had fully decorated the trees before I determined that we needed to recut the stump. I wouldn’t recommend it, but we didn’t break any decorations.</p>
<p>Thank you both so much. It really does smell great. I think I’ll try misting for a day or so and see what happens. I just want it to make it to Dec.25!</p>