Dutch Elm Disease - What Spreads It?

[cjcocn]

I have an opportunity to get about 5 cords of elm. I don't have to fall it or even buck it up (well, some may have been cut too long).

My concern is that I may be bringing Dutch Elm Disease back to my own elm trees if I burn or even keep this firewood on my property.

If I de-bark it before I bring it home, will that protect my trees from this disease? The land owner told me that it would as per his discussion with the local tree service guy.

I read online that the disease is carried from tree to tree by a beetle. However, I wonder if I will be releasing spores of the disease by burning it and thereby infecting my (all) healthy elm trees that are in my yard.

There is some info online about it, but I figure that I would also ask here due to the wealth of information that the AS members have.

Thanks!

 

[tomtrees58]

elm# is junk aney way# move on# tom trees

 

[ericjeeper]

Elm is mighty fine wood

elm# is junk aney way# move on# tom trees

I can not answer your question about spreading it. But red elm is worth bringing home if you verify it being safe.eric jeeper

 

[stihl sawing]

elm# is junk aney way# move on# tom trees

If it likes the elm we have here i would leave it. Hard to split and don't keep to good. It is not red elm though. This stuff is whitish color all the way through. Sorry, can't help you with the disease part.

 

[wkpoor]

I do not know what spreads it but I doubt you bringing it home will change the fate of your existing trees. If they are susceptible to it then they will contract it through act of nature regardless. Around here Elms thrive but only to about 6" in diameter. Then they die on their own. Just like trying to stop the Emerald Ash Borror. They have tried all sorts of quarantine to no avail. Only mother nature can stop them when she sees fit.

 

[clearance]

What spreads it?

The Dutch of course, those wooden shoed bastids.

 

[Nailsbeats]

One way it spreads is through the root systems of trees that are connected underground, I know that much. I think a beetle does the rest.

Elm around here is awesome firewood, I have tons of it. Use a hydraulic splitter to split it of course.

You can let the bark fall off them standing, then drop em' and put em' right in the stove. I drool over the dead Elm I see standing on the sides of the road.

 

[NDtreehugger]

I burn a lot of Elm do to the Dutch elms disease both American and red Elm.

And I like them both far far from junk. Keeps my home warm in -40 degree weather -80 wind chill north wind and all, it’s a very good wood just not for the week at heart when it comes to splitting best way to split is with a splitter and not a cheap one.

(I like it better then White Ash)

As far as the spread of the disease
#1 Bark Beatle 2 types
#2 infected root to root contacts I should do more research on this some say it’s not possible.

To prevent the spread remove the bark before you transport and you’re good to go.

All the near by American Elm trees seems to be dying do to the DED but I have one in the back yard that is thriving with barkless Elm firewood all over my yard! That would be a good indicator Elm with no bark is harmless.



Get it cure it and burn it, great stuff

 

[Nailsbeats]

Here's a couple pics of a Dutch Elm Diseased tree I took down a while back. Neighbors's were in a line for the firewood, mint condition and hard as a rock. This tree is over a house on one side, open power on the other, and right next to a golf course. Had regular spectators on golf carts, good times.

That's me up there.

Had to bring er' on down.

 

[NDtreehugger]

Dam Shame to loose the American Elm NT

 

[Geez]

I used to treat elms for Dutch Elm disease so I do know a little about this.
The disease is spread by both the American and European elm bark beetles. The beetle chews on tender young twigs and then rubs his shoulders in the wound. The hairs on it's shoulders carry a fungus that then infects the tree. The fungus spreads and plugs up the sap routes of the tree. As it gets worse the upper most branches are the first to die and turn yellow. This is called flagging and is the beginning of the end for the tree.
The beetles tunnel under the bark laying eggs as they go and then die at the end of the tunnel. The eggs hatch and eat their way away from the main tunnel, growing and enlarging their own tunnels as they go, eventually emerging. These tunnel systems end up looking like carvings of long legged centipedes and are called galleries. If the main tunnel goes with the grain of the wood, it is from the American beetle. If it goes across the grain it is from the European beetle. If you peel the dead bark off a tree killed by the disease you will find hundreds of these galleries. They figure one six foot log can produce hundreds of thousands of beetles.
If the wood is debarked, it is no longer suitable 'brood wood' and is safe to store.
Yes the disease can also spread through the roots. If the crown of a standing tree touches the crown of another elm tree, the roots can 'fuse' or grow together, thus spreading the disease from tree to tree in succession. That is why when the disease was in it's heyday, you would see whole boulevards of stately elms die in succession like falling dominoes. We used to control this by injecting a soil fumigant into the ground that would burn the roots apart, but we were just buying time because the roots would grow back.
You can also infect your trees by pruning them with unsterilized tools that were used on diseased trees or firewood.
But other than those three ways, there is no way to infect your standing trees. A pile of debarked firewood will be safe.

 

[mimilkman1]

Here's a couple pics of a Dutch Elm Diseased tree I took down a while back. Neighbors's were in a line for the firewood, mint condition and hard as a rock. This tree is over a house on one side, open power on the other, and right next to a golf course. Had regular spectators on golf carts, good times.

That's me up there.

Had to bring er' on down.

That is a lot of heat in that there tree. It makes me drool.

Kyle

 

[cjcocn]

... That's me up there...

You is high!

Great pics, thanks for posting those up!

 

[Rookie1]

One way it spreads is through the root systems of trees that are connected underground, I know that much. I think a beetle does the rest.

Elm around here is awesome firewood, I have tons of it. Use a hydraulic splitter to split it of course.

You can let the bark fall off them standing, then drop em' and put em' right in the stove. I drool over the dead Elm I see standing on the sides of the road.

+1

 

[svk]

Just curious.

One of the posters mentioned elm makes it up to 6" diameter before the bugs get it.

Is this because the smaller trees are inhospitable to bugs? Or some other reason?

I see a decent amount of small elms growing on the outskirts of towns. The native forests were already in decline when I was a kid in the the 80's.

I remember hunting with my dad and we came across the remainder of a huge elm way out in the middle of the woods. Hadn't seen an elm within a mile and a half but this one was just there.

My logger friend tells me he does come across stands of rock elm here and there but I've yet to see any.

 

[mbergeon]

Dutch elm is a fungus spread by insects.

In mid-Michigan I have a lot of trees that die off at around 6"

There are still plenty of bigger elms.

I watch them, once the bark turns yellow, I know I'll find Morel mushrooms around them in the spring, next winter, bark will begin falling off, if I cut it then the trunk will still be a little wet, wait a year, all the bark and small branches are gone, and it can go right to the stove. Wait too long and powder post and fungus start to decay the tree.

 

[Cody]

There are a lot of red elm's around here smaller than 6" that are dead. Just the other day I yanked one out of the ground to make a shooting lane, took it to the garage and and cut it up with the sawzall.

 

[svk]

There was one almost perfectly pure stand of big ones, about 20 acres square. I no longer have access to that because it's posted now but it abuts public land. Should see take a walk sometime to see if there are any remnants.