Fungi and tree host interactions

Sean Freeman

This got stimulated by the thread Some advice for my neighbor?....

Sometimes we miss the connection in things we observe simply because we have observed it for a long time (possibly always)...the odd looking blisters common on Delonix (in NQLD anyway) is just such an instance.

I had been seeing these things for years and often wondered about them...



and a less then adequate closeup sorry...


Now it was a conversation with Adam that pointed me towards fungal interlopers..(ok Adam told me he thought it was Nectria sp I fess up!)

But when working on a longer term development project here in Townsville I actually got to see the things initiate, had not seen it before...confirmed the fungal element....





The pics aren't brilliant, but the splits produced large amounts of exudate running down the stem and dripping onto new pavers, the infection never seems to penetrate deeper than the outer phellem layer of the bark...



I suspect the Nectria sp is playing tag with the tree in the phellogen.

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Eric Frei

Ever seen any fruiting bodies like in this document from NZ?

http://www.fhrc.org.nz/documents/nec...ield_guide.pdf

Also a great document attached with canker descriptions and pictures.

Attached Files

	canker-diseases-of-trees.pdf (1.07 MB, 120 views)
	nectria_field_guide.pdf (3.87 MB, 8 views)

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Sean Freeman

What a great document No have never seen the red fruiting bodies but have seen the very small orange ones, but on clearly long dead branchwood.
I believe Nectria is a big deal for production silviculture, as well as fruit and nut producers.

What was of particular interest (there's heaps in the pdf!!) in the pic of the radial cross section and the comment about dry white wood being associated with Nectria infections and facilitating the entry of the fungi...I tend to take a slightly different view that yes dysfunction...oxygen ingress is critical to the fungi getting a mycelial hold on things, but after that the fungi actively pumps water out fromt he areas it colonises...it actually creates dry areas within the wood tissues.


Here's a pic taken on the road up to Mt Tambourine of a fruiting body (maybe Ganoderma sp?) quite deep in a split-lightning strike on a Tallowwood E. microcorys...look closely you can see on the edge of the fruiting body moisture that is being removed from the wood tissues within (pic taken around 1.30pm.. hot dry day..not dew)

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Eric Frei

So what's the treatment for it? They mentioned fungicide but seemed to be at the point of pruning.

And with that poinciana in your 1st post, what's going to happen with it?

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Sean Freeman

Nothing, the blisters have absolutely no (visible) impact on tree health.

As for treatment well get the tree as healthy as possible and keep it that way...IMO, often these interactions are no problem for healthy trees, but remove half their root system and wack! Very much like humans we rarely die of the most serious aspect of an illness more often than not fall prey to minor virus/bacterial infection once our immune system is swamped! (Yes I know, analogies can cause more trouble than they are worth!!!!)

Eric Frei

I gave an ailing pot plant beer on a regular basis, it died!

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treeseer

Looks more like Inonotus; the droplets are good identifiers. i saw one like that in the heart of a big busted pecan tree. bad actors.

what makes you think thatg is nectria on the delonix?

yes the small orange saprophytic dots are nectria cinnabarina i think. coral spot we call it.

Sean Freeman

It could well be Inonotus Guy. the nectria call on the Delonix was Adam Tom's no reason to think he is incorrect, just don't know which species.

treeseer

I don't suppose ID is critical here, if the rot goes no deeper. But it is still interesting how that genus is often suggested without ID. Is that because it was in a shigo book?

Good call on assessing the limited extent of decay, and the lack of cause for an unequal reaction.

treevet

Nice thread Sean. Over the years I had observed apparent swelling in trunks at times and "missed the connection" but was aware of an aberration.

This, I came to discover may be a condition referred to as "bottle butt" (my neighbor has it also but this is caused by McDonalds) and may be caused by extensive selective delignification from Ganoderma applanatum.

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treevet

Did you ever wonder what happens when rot, through successive and successful repeated attacks by decay causing orgs. has overcome defenses and taken over storage space in the rings outside of the xylem? The tree has evolved to function in a precise way based on available resources and environment and genetics and genus etc., then it tries to store carbs for future needs and storage space is not there anymore. Does the tree overgrow with this excess food? Does it become "fat" like people do when they overeat? Is this part of the strategy of fungi to delete defenses by causing the tree to fracture?

treevet

Coincidentally after making previous post I was called to look at a fallen tree that exhibits the "appearing healthy but extremely hazardous" we've discussed. The tree that went over had wires on 2 of 4 sides ( one side entire nborhood svc) but missed everything. I have had no contact with this property before. It is a sweet gum, liquidamber, and was full with growth and appeared to have only one canker on the area it failed. Also there is a fruiting body I see as being (no expert here) Fomes fomentarius. The entire stem on both sides of the break was delignified wood. It appeared to be only held up by vascular wood. Why could this very healthy tree not fight off this decay with only a relatively small necrotic area and not very deep?

They asked me to look at other trees and found the other sweet gum pictured to have a cavity, necrotic areas seeping photosynthate right in the same area as the other gum failed tree. The tree was cut back from the wires so the balance of this 70 foot tree is weighted towards the house with again a very full sail/canopy.

I told the potential client I would probably keep the tree, thin the canopy, and lighten the house side after quantifying the decay. The other tree couldn't hit the house, this tree couldn't miss a heavy hit no matter what.
I said I would also make sure my coverage included wind damage as the other one was just covered if lightning damage. He wants it out and there was no indecision. He had no knowledge of any problems prior. I said that exhibits the need for a high level arborist to inspect properties.

Any climber would have climbed this tree on a mildly windy day. The non fallen gum also had that "bottle butt" appearance I mentioned in an earlier post.

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Eric Frei

LOL, beautiful. The VTA signs were like a billboard and the two bob Ryobi would have had that well and truly condemned.

It's also such a critical height in a trees stem for support forces.

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treevet

The other one may be a carbon copy. Trying to set up client so he feels he made the decision. This (pictured) tree did not have so much as a dead twig in it's canopy.

Eric Frei

Oh yeah, many say "but it was still green and healthy when it fell".

Yes, and my tooth was still sharp and healthy when I paid $1500 for root canal.

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treeseer

Good analogy.

And nice pics dave. unusual rotter; I've seen many a sweetgum cut and never seen such delignification

treevet

Thanks Guy, and that is the transition period you and I spoke of a while back. Still hard enough to pass the "mallet test" and along with the perfect canopy, a climber might go up and just be the difference swinging around the top to put that tree on the ground also.

treevet

I am borrowing that one if you don't mind.

treeseer

I just pruned a big sweetgum today; thanks to this thread i checked it out more than usual.

Codit lightly struck the trunk with a rubber mallet, eliciting a solid sound. “See?” he asked, “my resonance test does not indicate a cavity, so can there be decay inside this area? ...

After lunch Codit grabbed the toolbag ... The stem gave little resistance as he drilled through it with the slender bit. “It’s so rotten--why didn’t it sound hollow when I hit it?”

Rodrigo held up a copy of Fungal Strategies of Wood Decay in Trees. “Here’s the answer, amigo—it looks like this picture of Ustulina deusta” he said, quoting, “’With this kind of decay acoustic velocity is not reduced, even at the late stage of decay.’” He put the book back into our crate of references.

So Dave it's not just transitional areas, but some sp. of rotters resonate differently than others.

"A basic issue in basic tree risk assessment is the need to distinguish tree health from tree structure. Tree workers and tree owners may see that the leaves are a nice shade of green, and conclude that the tree is safe. However, arborists understand that healthy foliage is not a reliable indicator of structural integrity. Judging a tree’s strength by how it looks at first is like judging a book by its cover. Tree structure, not appearance, is the major focus of tree risk assessment. Visual tree assessment must be combined with hearing, smelling, touch, and judgment."

Attached Files

Dendro 8 Terrible Tar.pdf (443.8 KB, 88 views)

treevet

Read your post Guy and agree. Here are some picts of a tree we are removing from a house again. Very dangerous as tree is half on and half hanging off the side. No attachment at stump either so rolling is a poss at anytime and I had to work in the reach of the roll out of necessity.

Like I said in post in whattya get up to....this tree had been heavily fertilized with high nitrogen by a chem only treeco and we got a lush growth with spring rains and we've had 80 mph straight line winds and decay was not even mentioned according to HO. Over 90 % delignified wood and over she goes.
House was condemned after fire dept, police, building inspector, news all left, leaving guess who to figure this mess out. In pict we had taken half the canopy out. We got more by end of the day but the hard part comes when it is time to detach tree from house. Big $ number on this job. Tree is much larger than it appears. The origen at base is way down an embankment. Looks vaguely like this trees problems may have started by included bark, a likely scenario for fungi invasion.

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newguy18

so whats yuor plan for removing it from the house?Picking sections of with the crane and bucket?

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Eric Frei

"yeah listen love, our one size fits all jungle juice fertilizer will have that tree so healthy and lush you'll be the talk of the street."

When in fact you'd be masking trouble and artificially promoting a larger heavier canopy.

Looked pretty bad from this pic with some good VTA signs.

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treeseer

No spit; that black crusty stuff a blind man could sense as hypoxylon, way advanced. in that story i was short of room or i woulda put in a paragraph about blinky, my sub who came down while climbing a maple that had the same stuff and broke at the base. He and the tree bounced off a house; he has a busted nose and a wrenched knee; i was out $1000 for inflated home repairs.

nice pics; yes the fert fed the rotter, no doubt.

Garry Brockley

they probably just gave it some farm 20-10-10 ooh look the trees all green looks healthy love
Is that the start of a basal acvity between the butreses (the dark area)in that picture
we have alot of innonotus hispidis in the ash trees here had to do alot of take outs due to the assesor saying remove theyr'e not interested in long term care. if the estate i do work for saw that, it would be out double time (scared to death of legal come back from public)

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treevet

I ran out of reach with my 55 foot picker but got all the canopy off and a lot of weight that hung over the ground that could let it roll. Also got the limbs that were stuck in an ash that were keeping it from rolling (they had to come off to boom into side of embankment). To make a little safer, I have a three quarter inch double braid attached to a maple next to the base that probably won't stop the roll, but might give me enough time to escape before it flops off the house and it would have to tear off the chimney to do that (but it is heavy enough to do it).

After I get some more weight stripped off with my 70 foot picker and my truck crane tomorrow I am hoping one of two of my subs shows up as nobody responded yet.
I think if either comes with either a 30 rr mount truck crane or a 35 ton crane we can pick up tree off house and boom down beside house without not hitting AC unit and work on it there. I'd like to get one guy's 50 tonner buy it would crush sidewalk, not fit in space, driveways is too steep and road has mass wires right over that side. I got the AC covered if it does get crushed as this guy is an insurance agent and he understands "incindental damage" as I explained it to him. Also got the payment arrangements pre set up as I hate to worry about that while doing job and I NEVER do an insurance job where ins pays me. If HO has problems, I got absolutely no leverage as tree guy vs their ins co. HO pays me and they collect from their ins co from invoice.

treevet

Tree must have impacted house so hard as butt ended up behind the stump.
This scene has the whole nborhood checking their trees. Where was all this shit in the winter? This guy bought the "jungle juice" , EAB treatments for a POS ash and injected the shit out of the elm that fell for DED when there is no evidence of any in the neighborhood. The chem guy ("tree co") told the guy he couldn't think about handling the removal and to call me. These people are preyed on like they are blind when they spend their budget. Mass other high risk issues on property I pointed out. They pick the cheap guys and take it up the pooper.

treevet

Here is a beech we worked on today that I have been involved with for about 25 years. Prior to us, an extensive concrete cavity filling was installed with nails for securing, segmented portions probably seperated by wax paper and done to current industry standards. What we have now is approx. 20k lbs of free standing concrete pier seperated from the tree entirely because of decay. It could fall right out of the cavity and kill somebody. The only thing holding it together is 4 or 5 cables I installed 20 years ago. It will get a good look this winter. They and prev owner would die before cutting this tree down. It is still quite beautiful.

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treevet

Here is another pict. Previous pict is concrete in middle and if you look close you can see nails (industry standards I assume)

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treeseer

hmm, quite a challenge. would the owners die if you suggested a de-ivying?

treevet

I guess that is in vogue now.