Aliens & Pests

The US Army Corps of Engineers is planting American elms, Ulmus americana, on a man-made island in the Mississippi River. The Corps planted 21 American elm saplings on Eagle Island to replace other species washed away in a flood. Elms once were a dominant species on Mississippi River bottomlands until they were nearly wiped out by Dutch elm disease. The new saplings come from trees with at least some resistance to the disease. The planting program is part of the US Forest Service American Elm Restoration Project.

Georgia residents are being asked to watch plants in their yard for signs of disease in an attempt to detect infection with Phytophthora ramorum, the fungus the causes sudden oak death. Special attention is being paid to camellias, lilacs, viburnum, azaleas, rhododendron and mountain-laurel. These plants are known hosts for the fungus, which usually causes leaf spots or twig dieback. The fungus can be fatal to oak trees, and the program is an attempt to eliminate the disease from home gardens before Georgia's valuable and extensive oak forest is infected. Ornamental plants were sent to Georgia from infected Monrovia nurseries in California, so state agriculture authorities suspect that infected plants are in the state. Georgia authorities quarantined plants shipped from Monrovi and other California nurseries, but not until over 49,000 plants had been sold.