Post by marielouise on Jun 17, 2012 12:17:50 GMT -5
My son came over earlier and I went and looked at an oak tree with him . Its ""weeping'' & has some white foamy stinky looking crap in places , and a liquid coming out the bark and running in dark streaks to the ground --- ground is soaked with this stinky mess in places around the bole .
I surfed around and found out that it is called bacterial wetwood or slime flux--- no treatments listed on the sites I found, not much info other than name and description . Most sites want ya to call their tree doctors!!!
His concern is that he has seen his horses near it , and nosing it--- it does have a horrific smell--- butterflys are feeding on the liquid as it runs down. and he is worried if this is harmful to his horses IF they are licking it.
From the info I read it is caused by a bacterial infection from either a bark injury or enviormental stress, didn't see any bark injury's but they could be higher up than I could see clearly. The bacteria enters into the tree then this is how the tree is trying to fight off the bacteria or isolate it and grow new wood . Naturally occurring bacteria that is in the ground or the water and some how enters the tree sap thru the bark injury or the roots and causes this disease. .
Has any of you had any experience dealing with this ? We have never seen this before as many oaks as there are growing around here but could be we just never noticed it , but it does have a very strong odor!
I suggested to him maybe run some fencing around it to keep the horses off and see what happens. But there's also the question of the disease spreading to the other oak trees near by. None have any signs as of today. We checked the ones nearby but didn't go all the way to the back 40--- it gets very brushy back there... And I didn't have boots on..
The drought of the last couple years have killed so many trees here, I hate to lose another .
One forestry site said not to drill holes to "drain" as that could cause further infection to non infected parts but also said there is controversy over to drill or not to drill!
I surfed around and found out that it is called bacterial wetwood or slime flux--- no treatments listed on the sites I found, not much info other than name and description . Most sites want ya to call their tree doctors!!!
His concern is that he has seen his horses near it , and nosing it--- it does have a horrific smell--- butterflys are feeding on the liquid as it runs down. and he is worried if this is harmful to his horses IF they are licking it.
From the info I read it is caused by a bacterial infection from either a bark injury or enviormental stress, didn't see any bark injury's but they could be higher up than I could see clearly. The bacteria enters into the tree then this is how the tree is trying to fight off the bacteria or isolate it and grow new wood . Naturally occurring bacteria that is in the ground or the water and some how enters the tree sap thru the bark injury or the roots and causes this disease. .
Has any of you had any experience dealing with this ? We have never seen this before as many oaks as there are growing around here but could be we just never noticed it , but it does have a very strong odor!
I suggested to him maybe run some fencing around it to keep the horses off and see what happens. But there's also the question of the disease spreading to the other oak trees near by. None have any signs as of today. We checked the ones nearby but didn't go all the way to the back 40--- it gets very brushy back there... And I didn't have boots on..
The drought of the last couple years have killed so many trees here, I hate to lose another .
One forestry site said not to drill holes to "drain" as that could cause further infection to non infected parts but also said there is controversy over to drill or not to drill!