Tony Croft aka hamadryad

only time will tell, I have no personal experience of this as yet, though I took an ash down last year that had died suddenly, from what I thought was armillaria but something was not right about it. I have the shots somewhere still I hope just a question of finding them amoung the tens of thousands!

This IS going to spread like wild fire it wont benifit anyone in the long haul The loss will be more than just trees, the ash veteranises easily and is one of the few tree species still providing roosting sites for bats owls etc in any great numbers. The ash is one of our most vital ecological niches, this loss is going to be appalling.

It doesnt really matter why they took so much trouble, just that they proved that this much control is possible. I have used three way lowering, the ability to control not only fall and descent but direction of travel in a fully 3dimensional way is on another level. This is rarely needed though on a day to day basis, good skills to have though and these boys specialise!

The way i clean my boots before a visit to an ancient woodland would not give a disease a chance! they are like new when i leave the house, another reason I try to keep boots only till they start to get tatty no crevices to hide in boots of good condition:thumbup1:

have also tweeted the survey now! should get you a good response!

Yep i can see why she moaned! lol wicked pumpkin dude!

I am going to link this to my face book page to help this a bit, some of those here will bias the survey as many of us take great care regarding Pand D issues. I for one pour boiling water over the soles of my boots and scrub before visiting a site.

nice clean looking site, well done mate.

done:thumbup1:

Well the day is almost upon us, got mine done today and lit up on the window sill for the kids to see as they come a knocking for their candy fix!

The markets going to be saturated with standing dead pre seasoned ash soon enough!

not just your friends silky, they are part of the "mother earth" that sustains you, respecting/revering these wonders is as natural as breathing. they are your kin

I would like to try and find an endophyte that we could innoculate the elm scrubs with that can outstrip the mycelium of novostoma if wecould breed it with P ostreatus and form a super hybrid capable of producing the nematode paralyzing toxin ostratin we would be onto a winner

This Chalara is here, its not going to be restricted by the actions of man, we would be wise to only fell the dead ones and allow those that have some natural resistance to survive rather than cull them all in a sterilization process which is futile. Another british icon that will be confined to rarity

I have been known to put a splint on the odd broken fungi so the spores can fallout normaly!

lol, yep I needed to pay more attention!

I agree with James here, though it depends on where you look at the industry, academic research is slow process and takes a while to filter into the main stream of arboriculture, even when it does it is via a mediator. A person who attends and is interested in theory of arboriculture to then take that info to the masses who do not have any interests in deep ecology or arb theory. Its here at THIS type of resource/interface where real shifts occur, and I agree with James that there has been certainly in the last 4 years a major increase in awareness of many issues. I am feeling very posative about the near future, even this forums general members are posting questions and finds and inquiring on things they did not before consider. We as an industry are becoming acutley aware of the true nature of trees and the environment in general, and the role trees play in all. As long as we all continue in this quest for truth and of knowledge things can only get better, more sustainable, and sooner or later all that was before will fade into distant memories. The future is bright:thumbup1:

these are the field parasol and another lepiota, though difficult to pin down, nice find yes the field parasol would have sporolated just fine in that state:thumbup1:

As to the ash chalara is now here and spreading, we will be VERY busy in the coming five years millions of ash to fell and lots of firewood to be had. This is a tragedy that was so easily avoided and is the fault of our industry in allowing this trade to continue a lesson that should have been learned with dutch elm disease or DED this yew, look to see if the dying branches are connected to a narrow strip of sunken bark or canker. potential disease Amylostereum laevignatum

why? have you established the level of decay? NO trees that are healthy and growing well compensate for decay, if the tree is dying back and sick then yes I may agree, but not without at the very least a core to confirm your prognosis.

your first resipinate fungi is very common this year in the current damp conditions in which it thrives coniophora puteana lots about this year, if your lucky youll also see a more olive green version, and the bright yellow fan resupinate coniophora arida and Schisopora paridoxa is a much more toothy crustose fungi, very common on cherry (p Avium and also on birch burrs) the second is a postia sp or tyromyces

nice one Katie, ont the root failure with the high water table what species of tree? this is probably perenniporia

This is most likely a minor colonization via armillaria, look for a stressed branch connected to the vascular channel associated with this portion of the stem cambium. it may be the branch is on the other side if helical grown and an "edge tree" (avenues for example) quite normal, improve growing conditions and it will be minor