Dutch Elm Disease?

[Tom Albrecht]

In my area there were loads of elm trees at one time. Most have been infected and removed. We still have some that occasionally get cut down and our local turners wonder if is is okay to turn elm that has been removed because of Dutch Elm Disease? When I say "okay" I mean is it harmful in any way? Does it spread the disease?

 

[Russell Nugent]

In alberta we have an elm season. You are not allowed to cut/prune any elm tree between April 1 and October 1. The fresh sap apparently attracts the beetles which carry the disease. You aren't allowed to cut and store elm as firewood. You can remove and bury/burn all bark, or kiln dry, which will kill the beetles.
It is illegal to bring wood with bark into alberta from anywhere.
So far we have remained Dutch elm disease free in most areas.

 

[Steve Tiedman]

Tom, I don't know the answer, but I'd guess wood under the sapwood layer is probably fine. In my area (MN), when DED wiped out countless trees in the 1970s and 80s (when I was a kid the entire street canopy was a tunnel of elm, and it all died, later removed in one week leaving nothing behind but the clear blue sky), it seems a popular tree to replace it with was ash. Ash, and ash, and ash. Ash trees everywhere. And 30 years later, enter the emerald ash borer bug. Bye-bye ash trees, darn near every one of them. Now in summertime ash trees are identifiable from a block away because they are all dead or dying. And birch forests in the northern part of my state suffer from birch blight issues.

Moral of the story- urban trees and rural forestry can't be sustained around single species, because remember, nature likes a balance. Forests of all regions need biodiversity to survive.

 

[Brent@TurnRobust]

Hi Tom, I'm not an arborist, but DED is prevalent everywhere in the midwest, (I'm in Wisconsin, and I know you're in NE Illinois). Moving the wood around really won't have an effect. It's just everywhere already. On my own property, American Elm will grow to about 10" in diameter before succumbing and dying. So, although it seems to kill every darn elm tree around, it doesn't seem to have wiped out the species. Siberian Elm, considered an invasive, but also around here, does not succumb to DED. Personally, I think elm is boring as heck, and have never bothered to turn it. As Mr. John Jordan used to say.....