ded elm story

[treevet]

Here's a nice story about an old elm. But I cannot say I have heard of an elm withstanding any "bouts" with Dutch elm disease let alone the dozen mentioned in this article.

http://www.sphere.com/nation/articl...40-year-old-elm-tree/19308792?ncid=webmaildl1

 

[lumberjack333]

There are many elm that withstood Dutch Elm Disease, these trees have a slightly different genetic makeup than the ones that succumb to DED. There are some big old trees around here, and young ones... In some stands they are surrounded by their long dead brothers but because of there superior genetics have survived both bouts of DED that have passed through this area of Ontario.

 

[treevet]

There are many elm that withstood Dutch Elm Disease, these trees have a slightly different genetic makeup than the ones that succumb to DED. There are some big old trees around here, and young ones... In some stands they are surrounded by their long dead brothers but because of there superior genetics have survived both bouts of DED that have passed through this area of Ontario.

I agree with that but I do not think they (a genetically superior tree such as this) likely even contracted DED. Many other diseases may have been involved.

Once a tree has DED it is DEAD. You may block it for a while with such as a fungistat but it still has it and will spread and block the vascular system. I have run across many of these "Elm Institutes" come along and promise to "save" the tree but there is always a clause that they get to be paid for the removal. Everywhere I have seen these "contracts", the big elms are no longer there and are in the firewood pile.

If it withstood a bout of it means it was coming through an area then I agree.

I could be wrong but this is just how I have always understood it.

 

[lumberjack333]

I agree treevet, considering how the disease is contracted I think it would be pretty hard to control throughout the tree. You wouldn't be helping much by pruning out dead tips because you'd be cutting out the symptoms of DED not the disease itself. I think it is a nice old elm tree that lived well into its prime and is now just too friggin old. Oversenescent is the word I'd use, trees have a shelf life like people. 240 years is a long time for an elm growing in an urban setting. I bet it just has had long seeded issues with root development mostly, stressing the tree and allowing insects decay and fungus to set in.

 

[buzz sawyer]

Nice story - thanks for posting! Wish they had more pics of the tree. I remember some huge elms here as I was growing up - all gone now.

 

[John Paul Sanborn]

My take on it is that some trees can tolerate it better then others, especially if they are in an optimal siting. Then a stressing event comes along and POOF, they are gone.

The there is the dreaded grafting. Treat a tree for years, prune out any flagging, then a vollunteer in the lot-line, or on a neighboring property gets ignored (I have removed a few at a neighboring clients expense because they monitored the surrounding properties.) and POOF, they die from the ground up in a matter of weeks. I work on a couple of estates where the initiating tree was in surrounding buckthorn thicket that they did not want to "disturb" for the impenetrable screen and barrier that that crap gives year round.

 

[treevet]

I agree treevet, considering how the disease is contracted I think it would be pretty hard to control throughout the tree. You wouldn't be helping much by pruning out dead tips because you'd be cutting out the symptoms of DED not the disease itself. I think it is a nice old elm tree that lived well into its prime and is now just too friggin old. Oversenescent is the word I'd use, trees have a shelf life like people. 240 years is a long time for an elm growing in an urban setting. I bet it just has had long seeded issues with root development mostly, stressing the tree and allowing insects decay and fungus to set in.

Good points lumberjack, that is the kind of tree specimen they want to develop into a disease resistant cultivar we see around these days. One tough old boy to fight it off in that kind of compromised setting.

 

[John Paul Sanborn]

You wouldn't be helping much by pruning out dead tips because you'd be cutting out the symptoms of DED not the disease itself.

i think you do help; you allow a tolerant tree to survive long enough to spread it's genes. Maybe in a few decades tolerance will become true resistance.

The problem with DED is that it spreads do fast down the vascular tissue that any other added stress overwhelms the tolerant tree. During drought years I allays see an morbidity increase in wild areas.

 

[PinkFloydEffect]

Monday Jan. 18th 8AM I'll be there its a must! Recording in HD the whole time. See yall there!

 

[lumberjack333]

Was this tree proven to have dutch elm though? Or was it the urban setting and related stress that caused its decline. I think what your saying is true JPS but if this was an infected elm, then wouldn't it have died due to the stress its already under from root compaction/disturbance and the branching structure it would develope in an open area? A large tree like thats gonna need somewhere around 3x its crown area for root development, no?

 

[lumberjack333]

Holy hell, just read the part down near the bottom that states the cost of removal will be 20,000$ !!!! WTF?

 

[PinkFloydEffect]

Was this tree proven to have dutch elm though? Or was it the urban setting and related stress that caused its decline. I think what your saying is true JPS but if this was an infected elm, then wouldn't it have died due to the stress its already under from root compaction/disturbance and the branching structure it would develope in an open area? A large tree like thats gonna need somewhere around 3x its crown area for root development, no?

I read everything there is to know about DED and that tree (any elm) has successfully fought off the disease but it returns. The environmental stress sounds like it could have definitely helped the DED progress and this last time might just be too weak to fully recover and its showing signs of more damage in a single decade then any of its previous 13 decades. I literally just got off the phone with Frank Knight the guy that has been fighting it for over 55 years he told me he will be turning 102 this year. He told me a long story about his contribution to the tree over the past 5 decades. Let me know if you want his phone number I have it. What I would like to know is WHY there isn't any research groups trying to get a clone of this tree for its somewhat natural resistance to DED and cross it with other similar veteran Elms (I read that as a common technique).

 

[John Paul Sanborn]

Was this tree proven to have dutch elm though? Or was it the urban setting and related stress that caused its decline. I think what your saying is true JPS but if this was an infected elm, then wouldn't it have died due to the stress its already under from root compaction/disturbance and the branching structure it would develope in an open area? A large tree like thats gonna need somewhere around 3x its crown area for root development, no?

It says he was caring for it, so I assume it got the 3x Arbotech treatments.

 

[lumberjack333]

Now what I'm wondering is does the tree fight off the disease and have it return as a new infection, or was it infected once and has battled with it now for 50 years. I was taught that trees don't heal, as most of us know they compartmentalize the attacker and seal it off as to prevent it from spreading. What makes dutch elm different?

 

[PinkFloydEffect]

Now what I'm wondering is does the tree fight off the disease and have it return as a new infection, or was it infected once and has battled with it now for 50 years. I was taught that trees don't heal, as most of us know they compartmentalize the attacker and seal it off as to prevent it from spreading. What makes dutch elm different?

I dont know exactly to be honest, but I know it CAN be completely disinfected in rare cases on its own. The disease can either be spread by touching roots or the beetles returning to the same wounds, or new ones. I read the entire Wiki on DED. Also this tree hasn't been battling it for 240 years because the DED reached the US AROUND 1930s and made its way from the south I'm sure reaching Maine by the 1950s witch Frank might have caught just in time on the first infection or two, possibly why its so old. Caught the first infection and treated them all since. He told me he will explain more when we meet in Monday.

 

[John Paul Sanborn]

Now what I'm wondering is does the tree fight off the disease and have it return as a new infection, or was it infected once and has battled with it now for 50 years. I was taught that trees don't heal, as most of us know they compartmentalize the attacker and seal it off as to prevent it from spreading. What makes dutch elm different?

My understanding is that you need to rid the tree of the infected tissue. If the tree is vigorous it can shed a few isolated branches to word off the spread. This is what the fungistat is supposed to help facilitate. You protect the tree for three years with the infusion, and may not have to re-infuse if the pathogen is not currently endemic in the local environment. Since we often do not know if this is so, the clients are encouraged to get the treatment every 3-4 years so as to not waste the prior treatments.

 

[treevet]

It will be interesting to find out how he has been "fighting it off" all these years. My guess is that a more accurate assessment is that the tree has been fighting it off all those years. Once the injections began, if there were any, it also could be said the tree was fighting it off and it would be difficult to prove other wise. The injections could likely have ADDED to the tree's demise as well and the tree survived DESPITE injections, again, if there were any (don't think they were even mentioned. My guess the tree died from it's environment and climate combined with its over mature age. There are still some 200 year old elms I can show you around Cincinnati that have survived without any "treatments" even with diseased trees nearby and some even close enough to have concurrent roots.

Everything you read is not the "truth" in the newspapers. Also Wikipedia is an extremely UNRELIABLE source for information as anyone can send in data and info and it stands until someone else trumps it.

It was established historically that the disease came from Europe in the 20's and came on a ship load of logs into an Ohio port (not the South) and they were brought in by deceased billionaire Doris Duke (I used to live down the street from her estate) into Hillsboro, New Jersey. During the federal work programs of the 20's and past there were labor camps that went out and removed the diseased trees. I have met men that worked on these programs that were my clients. Companies like Bartlett (I think mainly them) used to go on properties in all white lab clothes with white jackets and systemically treat the elms. They had no success and it was thought to be a huge hoax back in the day for profit.

 

[PinkFloydEffect]

It will be interesting to find out how he has been "fighting it off" all these years. My guess is that a more accurate assessment is that the tree has been fighting it off all those years. Once the injections began, if there were any, it also could be said the tree was fighting it off and it would be difficult to prove other wise. The injections could likely have ADDED to the tree's demise as well and the tree survived DESPITE injections, again, if there were any (don't think they were even mentioned. My guess the tree died from it's environment and climate combined with its over mature age. There are still some 200 year old elms I can show you around Cincinnati that have survived without any "treatments" even with diseased trees nearby and some even close enough to have concurrent roots.

Everything you read is not the "truth" in the newspapers. Also Wikipedia is an extremely UNRELIABLE source for information as anyone can send in data and info and it stands until someone else trumps it.

It was established historically that the disease came from Europe in the 20's and came on a ship load of logs into an Ohio port (not the South) and they were brought in by deceased billionaire Doris Duke (I used to live down the street from her estate) into Hillsboro, New Jersey. During the federal work programs of the 20's and past there were labor camps that went out and removed the diseased trees. I have met men that worked on these programs that were my clients. Companies like Bartlett (I think mainly them) used to go on properties in all white lab clothes with white jackets and systemically treat the elms. They had no success and it was thought to be a huge hoax back in the day for profit.

I'd love to see them, and I understand the Wiki thing. That's only 1 source I read the other was a long report that was combined from many Elm researches. Yeah that entire paragraph is from the research paper, I thought it said it reached the Netherlands in the 20s and was reported in the US in the 30s I may be wrong. Please upload those pictures though of the 200 year old elms!

 

[treevet]

Here's one healthy as can be on a convent we have been on for 10 years now. Just sanitation/dead wooding nec.

 

[PinkFloydEffect]

Here's one healthy as can be on a convent we have been on for 10 years now. Just sanitation/dead wooding nec.

Amazing! Thank you TreeVet! Do you care for this tree personally?