Poorly Oaks

[Le Sanglier]

Crikey, they'll die of old age soon.

[Tony Croft aka hamadryad]

phew!

 

And ive been saying for a while that AOD photos ive seen have all the marks of typical armillaria presence.

[Glen Poole]

Hi all,

 

Sorry that I haven't been in touch lately but I was involved in a crash with a 20 ton grab lorry that wrote off my brand new Fiesta van which resulted in me being taken to hospital & having to have 6 weeks of physio & and another 4 to go so work & home life have been a little hectic since then.

 

I have been in touch today with Dr Sandra Denman from the Forestry Commission & I have some news.

 

In summary, they finished the analysis of the samples first taken & they are surprised at the results. They found the AOD bacteria associated with the lesions. They also found some fungi particulary Fusarium solani & these (from memory) are associated with brown streaking in the vascular tissues.

 

The site was visited again a couple of weeks ago & resampled some of the trees & are in the process of analyzing those samples.

 

We are know looking to see if the trees were imported from Europe or are they of local provenance & home grown right through.

 

In conclusion at this stage, the Forestry Commission has said this is one of the youngest set of trees they have ever isolated the bacteria from - and this is very worrying. They need to have more information about origins & planting conditions as well as a deeper look for insect damage. However, if AOD is the primary cause of the problem then its devastating, they have never seen such mangled trees.

 

Be patient. I will update soon.

[nepia]

Fascinating thread Glen but what a kicker re the accident; really sorry for you. Do as you're told and get well soon!

Thanks for coming back to us; it's feeling like a drawn out soap now!

[Le Sanglier]

Rough luck on the smash, thanks for the update, hope you make a full recovery.

[ben_inthewoods]

Very interesting thread. Hope you are recovered from the smash.

 

It would be very interesting to know the movement history of these trees. Would the quarantine of imported standards have allowed the poor health of the trees to be picked up?

 

(Did instant impact trees not bring in OPM?)

 

Regards

Ben