Problem with a Ginkgo tree.?

First, look at the trunk of the tree where it goes into the ground. If it goes in like a telephone, the tree was planted too deeply from the start. It takes a little while for the damage to show, which is why it did OK the first year. If this is the case, you will need to gently remove the soil around the tree until you have exposed the root flare, where the roots begin to spread out from the bottom of the trunk. Don't worry if this results in a dished out area around the trunk, just put a light dressing of green sand and mulch over it. You may run into roots that have begun to circle the trunk, which is called girdling and is one of the things causing a problem. Cut them off as close to the trunk as you can without cutting into the trunk itself. If you need some help with this, there are companies that specialize in exposing the root flare that aren't very expensive. And any organic nursery can give you advice as well.

Tree spikes are not the optimum way to fertilize, since a tree gets its nutrients from a much wider area than that. Fertilizing your entire yard with a good organic fertilizer is much more effective. Unfortunately, this also means if you used a weed and feed fertilizer on your lawn, you may have damaged the tree. If you did, the organic nursery can recommend some decontaminants that may help if the damage isn't too extensive.

Other things that can affect your trees are if a neighbor used a weed killer and it got washed into your yard.

The gingko likes moist sandy soil, so the drought may have stressed it last year. But it is generally a pretty hardy, disease resistant tree, and will get pretty big under optimum conditions.

Good luck!

If your plant was planted too deeply it wouldn't have grown at all, they 'sulk' from the start.

Ginkgo's are slow growing trees and they do need moisture to grow well. Fertilizer won't help if the plant is not getting enough water and spikes work by water gradually dissolving the fertilizer and feeding it to the plant. If you've not had much water than it probably did not get much benefit from the spike either.

The most important thing I've found with trees and I live in a particularly dry area is water. If I can't water them, they just go into 'survival' mode where they survive but you get no growth and a lot less leaves.

If you have drought type conditions where you are you will have to water this plant say weekly in the dry part of the year. Just leave the hose running on it half turned on for 1/2 hour. Keep the soil moist but not over watered. I wouldn't fertilize and stress it out any further until it goes into recovery mode. Give it a seaweed extract (from nurseries etc), I use seasol but there are a few, this is a plant tonic and it should help it along and get it going again without stressing it.

Don't worry I think its only lack of water and if you provide this in dry times it should recover. Good luck