New Strain Of Sudden Oak Death Surfaces In WA State Nursery

[hatrack]

"A previously unknown strain of the tree-killing disease known as sudden oak death has been found in a nursery in Washington state, a possible mutant child of the fast-spreading pathogen.

The discovery means that the European version of the disease has not only found its way to America, but may have mated with its California counterpart, which has killed tens of thousands of oak trees in the state.

"We detected a third strain with traits from both the U.S. and European strains," said UC Berkeley forest pathologist Matteo Garbelotto during the three-day Sudden Oak Death Science Symposium in Monterey. "It has some genetic traits in the DNA that we've never seen. It's a unique strain."

The fear is that the product of any such union could end up being a fungal version of Rosemary's baby. "The obvious risk," said Jonathan Jones, who manages the sudden oak death program for the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, "is that there could be sexual recombination, and we could end up with something worse than what we have."

EDIT

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2005/01/22/BAGG7AUGGF1.DTL

[amandabeech]

1. What tree species will we have left?

We have pretty much lost American elm and chestnut, although there has been considerable work in breeding which is supposed to give resistance of Asian varieties to American varieties while preserving other characteristics of the American varieties.

Emerald ash borer will eventually wipe out the ash trees.

Sudden oak death gets the oaks, and it sounds like beeches, too.

Hemlock is under attack.

I guess that leaves maple, sycamore and many conifers in the temperate belt, but that is a poor, poor forest. And I'm sure that there are pests about which will do them in, too.

I guess that we better start building more biomass electricity generating plants. We'll need them.