Pondering oak wilt control

[Gopher]

I'm feeling like "Norm" on "Cheers" this morning, so I'll start with a, "Hello Everybody". You all reply with a, "How's the World Treating You Norm?" I say, "Like a dog and I'm wearing Milkbone underwear!"

All right, I was studying a DNR report (WI) from 2003 where the forest health coordinator was studying the use of Garlon following girdling of all trees within grafting distance. The Johann Bruhnis model was used to determine which trees were likely to be grafted to known infected trees. This was in red oak.

They seem to be finding some success with this, but I still question whether this can work in a more "urban" setting. I a lot owner has 10 to 12 trees, all red oaks (I have an example like this), then all are in the graft distance and should be killed. Why do it, if there aren't any other oaks on adjoining properties? (I'm the homeowner talking.)

Also, I know that some in the area are treating oak wilt in red oak with Alamo and trenching to try and keep the spread at bay. What is the success rate? And more importantly, are these trees at or near their natural lifespan? Around here, I'd love to save as many stately trees as possible, but many of our red oaks are at the end of their lives. Do we put two new knees and a new hip in a guy that is 98 years old? While some will say, if he can afford it, go ahead. I say it is not ethical or moral.

Now, if we are trying to stop the spread in a stand that has a c hance to live another 50 years, I'm all for it. Don't get me wrong - I am glad that the scholars among us (you know who you are!) are learning and trying so we all may benefit from research and experimentation. If what we are promoting has the probability of nothing more than a crap shoot, we need to examine our preaching. (This is where JPS will rag on me!)

What I am doing here is trying to promote discussion. One long-term, established company will only inject trees that have been infected through root graft, while another large prominnet one will treat any and all oaks. Is one right and the other wrong?

Please write back and help me learn how to best assist our customers and our tree health.

So I'm "Waffling" a bit, but I ain't no John Kerry!

Have a good weekend all.

Gopher

 

[Reed]

I don't know if I can enter this quagmire. My models are distanced from yours and incorporate differences including behavioral patterns and growing mediums that suggest opposites from your known histories.

I can designate an approximate termination date in context to longevity of our red oaks...in this particular area and with known growth charateristics. Also, much similar to your problems, are the known attributes of specie in relation to susceptability and studied factors such as mycelia growth and spore production that threaten downstream hosts. I'm not sure you can predict - based on similar facts - that longevity for your trees is a given rather than an assumption. Here we can denote a 50-year lifespan based on architectures and evidence. There, I'm not so certain.

I do know that Alamo has not passed muster for treatment to infected hosts, insofar as literature notes, however it is promoted for such and some evidence indicates elements of success. But numbers can be read that interpret reds that recieved zero treatment also uphold statistical averages similar to published ones. Therein lay the frustrations.

Some municiple codes force actions that may not be based on known sicence, just the promoted stuff - and promoted powerfully it is. Your client may have to succumb to law, I'm not familiar with your area. But careful thought and research may help him/her/you. If no susceptable hosts are within proximity, is the attempt to try and save the state or are you trying to save his trees? Are you calling in an airstrike to kill the disease along with the trees or are there interested parties to intervention on behalf of these oaks?

Success rates vary - if we take test sights funded by the manufacturer we find phenominal recoveries, but that may indicate appropriate treatment protocols only the investing party can administer with. If we study unpublished and pirated reports, we find unacceptable responses when factored with expense of projects. If we look closely at competitor's results, we see again miraculous results, a step or so higher in surviving hosts. It's a marketing game polished by the costs of the participants and the power of the advertising literature and who has the savy with the state legislators.

Grafted distances vary - not just between urban and rural or forest. Most models from urban data disclude the fact that trenching couldn't occur where prior septic or utility lines were considered effective old barriers thus were not cut. Factors such as time it takes for re-grafting weren't included before publishing success rates. Depth is an operator's call, we just can't designate absolutes, thus data is further questioned.

There are methods not yet approved but those varied approval peer-reviewed studies leave vast chasims in knowns and unknowns, the very problems with science today. Staistical averages are all you can go by buttressed with local laws and who helped legislate them. Just remember that Adriamycin cures cancer by killing the patient, a simple given omitted by the literature.

 

[Gopher]

Exactly...

Your thoughts expressed are the way I am trying to see through this situation as well.

Send me an e-mail with contact information - I would appreciate the chance to discuss these issues with you.

Thank you, Oakwilt.

Gopher

 

[Reed]

Some evening I would like to employ our 'chat room' option with you - I think better when it's on demand.

Phone conversations are a problem here.

In the meantime it's [email protected]

-or [email protected]

 

[Kneejerk Bombas]

The problem with Alamo is it only stops insect infections, it does not stop root graft infections. So with high value trees that are not close enough to infected trees for root grafts, go ahead and inject. Of course, you need to weigh the high cost of treatment with the slim odds of insect infection.

The problem with using Alamo along with trenching, or even alone, is that it masks the spread of wilt by hiding the symptoms.

For Gophers client with 12 trees inside the infection center, the best protocol may be to plant replacement trees now. For the cost of treatment, some nice trees could be planted. Perhaps even treat the trees to get a few more years out of them while the new trees establish.

 

[Reed]

I think that's why trenching was suggested in his case - a treated host can transfer the infection onward.

Effectively isolating underground (common root systems) transmission has varied success rates...depth of cut and timing along with re-grafting in a now rapid-growth environment has questioned the practice here in Texas long thought to be successful. It also discounts the possibility of overland spread by vectors not recognized yet by research.

I can advocate a bit for the treatment here by illustrating a human health parable: buying time by administering an agent that would impair tumor development for a year while research shows promise for a gene therapy that may be approved (post haste) for targeting the abberation in the cells that stimulate that particular tumor development. However (and it's an important 'however')...toxicity of the deferring treatment may negate further attempts later on. There appears no interest in the research currently that targets the host's abilities to contain and digest fungal presense.

That's why I call it a quagmire. More often than embarking on an aggressive treatment regimen we too advocate reforestation but in cases of particularly valuable trees it takes both boots on with all the tools necessary, not just one protocol backed by the law which reads the same data they publish. Injecting a fungistatic agent while wilt maintains it's presense is a palliative treatment at best. Repeat treatments being recommended will eventually girdle the host with dead vascular cells that will kill the tree - the ugly reality the lab doesn't seem too interested in tackling. For real estate agents however, it's the one element that makes or breaks the sale.

 

[Gopher]

This is why...

Arborists, this is why this site is valuable to me; getting minds together and reasoning about what is the best and most logical solution to a number of not only physical, but social tree issues.

Oak wilt, I could not agree more with the real estate part of your last answer. I have argued for years that a lot with power line easememts on it should be valued less than the one right next to it that does not. Do the realtors and developers point this out to prospective buyers that are all dreamy-eyed over the beautiful trees that will all be cut within five years? Not usually. Do they disclose that the pole shed hidden in the trees on the adjoining property is on land zoned commercial, and in a few years there will be 25 boats and motorhomes parked outside waiting to be wrenched on? Not usually.

Thank you Mike for your insight. We are going to remove the two that are already dead and flagging. Of course, it will not happen until the ground is frozen because that is the only way we can get them down and out of there without causing thousands in other landscape damage. This is another variable that many of the (I better be careful here) "Always by the book" enthusiasts seem to ignore. Most of the time when a tree is, let's say, "altered" by Mother Nature, it comes at a time when immediate mitigation just isn't practical. We have been removing many of these red oaks via the ice in the winter. It just makes sense.

Another client of mine, along the same lake, did have a number of her red oaks treated just a few years ago (before I lived here). They are all gone now. We removed three two years ago, four last year, and 4 more are now done awaiting the crane. Very sad, but what did all the money she spent (I think it was four years ago) do for her? Did it buy more time? I don't think it did, and they are all gone now. Sad but true.

Have a good day all. I am off to cut down a couple of elms, second generation now killed by the elm bark beetle! Just part of the job...

Gopher

 

[Reed]

"The problem with using Alamo along with trenching, or even alone, is that it masks the spread of wilt by hiding the symptoms."

Bingo Mike.

It also says a lot about social anatomy. Competition with neighbors (the "Jones') has made more than a few law dockets down here. Once consulted where one man sacrificed all his property trees to hopefully benefit the neighborhood. He was served to appear for not following the State's recommendations - which ended-up leaving the rest of the neighborhood dead anyway...three years post protocol.

Root of the problems - something not popular within our problem-solving regimens. Treat the symptoms, there's a market there and it grows as long as the cause is ignored.

 

[Yellowdog]

And they just keep dying.

I don't trust what the state says anymore. I have seen minimal success with Alamo where my neighbors have used it. Instead, the trees get uprooted and burned or chipped because they are dying anyway.

A little off topic but what about cutting a sick or dead tree and poisoning the stump? Does this work? I have cut down a lot of live oak trees that look 110% dead (bark falling off and everything) only to find life in the stump, moisture and all. What does this say about the root system and infection in those roots. Will a stump poison kill the stump and roots prior to grinding? Can stump grinding commence as soon as the trees are down or will that spread the infection quicker through the roots?

We are grappling with many infection centers here n.w. of san antonio, texas. Lots of dead and dying trees. Saw an incredible elm like live oak a couple of weeks ago that had just died. It was a majestic, tall tree. Now it's gone and the rest of the ranch is in peril.

I am getting more calls than ever for take downs. No calls for trimming just removals.

The attachment is typical of the trees dying around here. Wish I had a picture of the big one..

Everything, chips and all fit in a 20 yd dumpster filled all the way to the top. Cleaned up with a Bobcat and BC2000 and didn't make much of a mark on the ground but what a lot of chips!

 

[Guy Meilleur]

Nice before-during-after series, yellowdog. Wish it showed a happier story. I have no doubt we in NC will have our share of these epidemics before long. It's up to us to learn lessons from TX etc. so we can maybe do something to slow them.

I'd go nuts if all I could do about disease was to cut up the corpses.

 

[Gopher]

Another one bites the dust...

Nice pics Yellowdog. I dropped another red oak today; actually, pieced it apart, not enough room to drop it.

I once again pondered as I took the trunk apart, "This tree was in fairly bad shape - was it really the wilt that got it, or is that the label we want to put on it?"

The top I had to rig out, as I could not safely set my line into it, and yes, it was extremely hollow; and unbeknownst to me, there was a section about ten feet further down that was ant infested and punky which I did not detect earlier. There was enough sound wood this time... this tree just lost its leaves a number of weeks ago.

So, fellow arborists, what do you think? Trees on the average, like Guy says, were here before us, and last longer than we do. Do we use the 3 R's - respond, remove, replant, or do we go to something like "hooked on phonics"!

Friday, I climbed two more red oaks - one is 90% defoliated, the other, about 5 feet away and underneath it, no signs at all. The owner wants to know if the spread has occured yet. Nothing has been done on the first tree yet, as far too much landscape damage would occur getting it out of there prior to winter freeze up. I am trying to help him manage these two, and ten others.

Do we kill the next one in line, and a few more to try and save six?

They are all close... the hill is steep... most are all quite old...

Enjoy them while we can, and plant more. No one planted these, but then again, no one had ever planted houses where they are now before, either! How can we expect a number of these stately trees to make it when we jam 7000 square foot houses, one on top of another, on their roots?!

Just like people, many trees appear healthy for some time, and then "BOOM" we and they die, while some of us live to be 100+ and some trees (i.e. Wye Oak) make it to 460 and much more.

Yellowdog, was the oak you cut down quite mature? Any defects worth mentioning? We all want to save as many as we can...

Enough philosophy for now; I need to get working on a report on a wrongful tree removal - neighbor taking a neighbor's tree. Yes, of course, it appeared to be a very healthy red oak!

Safe working everyone.

Gopher

 

[Reed]

I propose we organize a oak wilt summit for our industry.

This time the panel should incorporate geneticists from the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center (my people), epidemiologists from the C.D.C., a couple of foresters from Scandanavia, Dr. Juzwick from the U of MN, an atmospheric scientist, and a couple of arborists from this site.

Time to get to the bottom of this debacle. The fiscal rewards of directed research haven't done much but sure have taken up some valuable time and trees.

We let medical treatment and delivery decisions fall into insurance industry hands. Let's not let plant health go the same road.

That or just shoot me.

 

[Guy Meilleur]

Great idea. I'd strongly suggest that people with firsthand experience :Eye: document it and propose to present at other conferences too. Minnesota's Shade Tree Short Course is next March. Its organizers by my experience are among the brightest and most open minds around. You don't need a PhD to present there, just a scientifically sound and relevant topic.

Re the summit, I would not exclude others from participating by failing to invite them, but I share your concern about a narrow segment of the industry being allowed to dominate the discussion so far. That can only change if other viewpoints are focused and objective and avoid antagonism and are presented with a practiced and head.

That ain't easy but it sounds like it'd be worth the effort.

 

[John Paul Sanborn]

I wish i could have read the whole thread, but I lack the time.

the points below, I've discussed with Dave already;

My research of availible data lead me to beleave that

1. 
   * There is no treatment for an infected red oak. Removal is the only option.
   * Immidiate stump grinding is a very good option for breaking the communal root system and protecting adjacent trees weather or not trenching is practical.
   * Alamo is a good fungistat to protect important adjacent trees as a profilactic. It is by no means a sure thing, but the efficacy is better then statistically sinificant.
   * we have no other treatment available at this time that has any track record. [/list=1]
   
   As other people have said, here and in other venues (I read it in SciAm not too long ago) we need more research that is not funded by a proffit motive. Maybe there are treatments are effctive treatments out there that would do not cost much to formulate or are not cost effective to manufactuer.
   
   How can a practitioner recomend things for a client if they are highly experimental and any evidence of efficacy is imperical at best?

 

[Guy Meilleur]

Originally posted by John Paul Sanborn
How can a practitioner recomend things for a client if they are highly experimental
How else are treatments going to get proven?

and any evidence of efficacy is imperical at best?

I assume you mean "anecdotal", which is the opposite of "empirical". Same answer as above, plus the need to deliver a service to the client and the tree. If that service is based on science and research and delivered with full disclosure of experimental nature, it is not unethical to deliver said service.

As expressed on previous threads, it would even be unethical (according to my personal sense of ethics, anyway) to fail to notify the client of treatments that may be anecdotal and not yet fully in the literature. Note: I have never treated a tree a tree for OW, so I don't pretend to know more than I've read about it.

 

[Reed]

You have to keep in mind the term "literature".

Who's literature? In addition, what it may conclude, not someone's interpretation of it.

 

[Gopher]

Strength in our minds...

I want all to know that I want to believe there can be a way to accomplish tree health, to mitigate and slow down illnesses, and to bring extra "fulfilling" days to a tree's life. If we cannot with some degree of accuracy bring to fruition the probability of extended tree life based on a certain criteria, then our efforts may be deemed insufficient.

Yes, we need to keep focused, listen and most of all question data that we have not seen come to pass in the field.

JPS brings up my name - I want to believe that what was completed at his place of employment has been worth-while; we just haven't seen the results yet. I have to wonder if the expentiture was worth the outcome. We will see.


I would be interested in serving on a panel.

Gopher

 

[MasterBlaster]

Ya'll Yanks ever seen pine beetles?

 

[MasterBlaster]

 

[Guy Meilleur]

Butch the epidemic these guys are working with make pine beetles seem like a prance in the park. Oak wilt is sinister, attacking on several unseen fronts. Dendroctonus may be smaller than a grain of rice, but it's easy to deal with in comparison.

I've seen people in tears at the loss of pines (and the removal$$$$) though, so I know what you're saying.

"Who's literature? In addition, what it may conclude, not someone's interpretation of it."
Yeah, it's all in the spin. I sometimes find preservationist implications in studies that many don't see.
Others will find reasons to remove based on science that I think make no sense.
and on it goes.