What is killing red oaks?

[Bone1099]

I have noticed in the past few years a large increase in the amount of red oaks dying in the woods. But its not just near the house it seems to be everywhere i had one guy tell me today that there was a fungus that came from up north. So I just tought i would run this by the powers that be in the wood shed and see what happens.

PS: Just split and stacked a cord of hickory this morning.

 

[RNLA]

OAK WILT, of some variety anyhow....

 

[oldspark]

OAK WILT, of some variety anyhow....

Yep seems to be harder on the red oaks than the white oaks.

 

[Backwoods Savage]

And it is sad to see. Too many of our trees are being attacked by some bug or fungus and huge areas are dieing off. Very sad. Of course I'm reminded whenever I cut wood because I'm cutting a lot of dead white ash.

 

[Thistle]

oak wilt affects red/black oaks,those are getting hit fairly hard in the midwest & elsewhere.Also gypsy moths took their share of both red & white oaks back in the late 1980's/early 1990's. Bur Oak Blight is now also in 25 Iowa counties according to the latest info from the DNR. Iowa has lost almost 30% of our oaks since 1954,while the total statewide forest cover has increased over 1million acres since 1974.

 

[Hunderliggur]

Probably millions of oaks (and other trees) are killed by chainsaws every year. Be careful.

 

[cmnash]

I'd say 25 % of the red oaks on my property and neighboring property have rotted heartwood. The carpenter ants then invade, set up house, and will hollow out the tree, finishing it off. I never heard of a specific disease attacking this species but will ask around.
I just pray it doesn't get any worse.

 

[Cascade Failure]

I'd say 25 % of the red oaks on my property and neighboring property have rotted heartwood. The carpenter ants then invade, set up house, and will hollow out the tree, finishing it off. I never heard of a specific disease attacking this species but will ask around.
I just pray it doesn't get any worse.

Easily 25%.

Look at the upside though, if you ever wanted to try to make one of the hollow log cannons like they did on MythBusters you have plenty of material.

For safety reasons I don't advocate you trying this........without me!

 

[billb3]

There's supposedly an oak wilt fungus out west .

I've lost a few red oaks here ( the white oaks seem fine) Patches of trees, sometimes acres big.Between the caterpillar infestations ( although they've been light and non-existant the last few years) and dry/wet extreme weather pattern, they don't seem to able to withstand an Oak Decline fungus. I think it's in the roots here . I've seen trees leaf out well in the Spring, even try to push some new growth and die in July/ August. Some blame the caterpillars , but I think it's a number of factors stressing them all at once.
I often wonder how many of these red oaks would even be here if they hadn't filled in where the chestnut trees used to be.

 

[DBoon]

I lost an enormous black oak tree to the oak wilt/fungus a few years ago - it was ~90 years old but doing well, but showing a few signs of its age. Then one summer it just dropped all of its leaves. It was a normal summer, so it wasn't due to drought or heat stress, or caterpillars. I had it cut down that summer. When something like this happens to a street/yard oak tree, you want to get it cut down pretty quickly or the wilt could spread to neighboring trees.

Luckily, the even larger black oak on the opposite corner of my lot is still doing very well.

 

[loon]

not sure where this is to you guys?

(broken link removed to http://arhomeandgarden.org/plantoftheweek/articles/Redoak_Borer.htm)

 

[benjamin]

If it is Oak wilt, you should be aware that it is spread by insects that infect wounds. Around here they say you shouldn't prune or injure any oak during the growing season, those months may be different for you.

 

[Thistle]

Yup. Pruning from March through June especially is a definite no-no.

 

[bboulier]

We've lost a lot of trees around here to oak wilt. It's been good for me in terms of wood supply, but is very sad otherwise. We have a neighbor catty-corner to our back yard who has an oak with fire blight. We are not in grave danger from her tree but a couple of neighbors on either side are.

 

[JeffRey30747]

We are seeing similar effects here in Chattooga county, too. I spent Friday afternoon on a few dead red oaks and there are many more there in the woodlot that are still standing. Whatever is killing the oaks here seems to affect the upland trees more than the river bottom ones as we haven't noticed any at the lower elevation (about 100-150' difference). We thought that it was just the drought stress but there may be something such as this oak wilt that is also involved. How can you tell that the wilt has killed a tree or is present?

 

[bboulier]

Here's a very good article about oak wilt in different species of oak: (broken link removed). The map is for 1998 and is outdated.

We have mostly oak decline around here. It's difficult to distinguish between the two, except that the dead leaves tend to stay on the tree with oak decline in the first year. The next year there are no leaves and the branches are dead.