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Scientists say sudden oak death epidemic is no longer stoppable

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Scientists say sudden oak death epidemic is no longer stoppable

#111

Post by [deleted] »

ars wrote: post #109
yongjik wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's like saying economic recession is a very slow and subtle process, and it's not responsible for every single person who lost job this year. Which is perfectly true. In fact, you'll never be able to conclusively show that a single person is jobless because of the recession. But when recession comes and millions lose jobs, I'll bet my ass that people will blame the economy and politicians will scramble to "do som…

An economic recession is not in the slightest a slow and subtle process, your comparisons are off by orders of magnitude.

[deleted]

Re: Scientists say sudden oak death epidemic is no longer stoppable

#112

Post by noir_lord »

beatpanda wrote: post #96
ars wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Climate change is putting stress on ecosystems that causes them to change more rapidly than they have in the past. Is it? You keep reading this story and that story about how this crop failed, or changed or whatever, and they always blame climate change. Then you check and see - oh yah, that also happened in this year and that year. Climate change is becoming like dark energy - blame absolutely everything you don't…

And that attitude is why society isn't going to adjust in enough time to avoid a whole bunch of extinction and ecosystem collapse.

We'll adjust just fine, we'll wreck the natural ecosystem doing it but in fairness we already did that anyway, UN reckons we have 38% of the earths land mass under some form of agriculture.

Wild Earth is going away, Garden Earth is coming, the first planet we terraform as a species will be Earth.

Note: I'm not saying this is a good thing but we will survive as a species and I wouldn't bet against us thriving.

Re: Scientists say sudden oak death epidemic is no longer stoppable

#113

Post by MikeHolman »

mathattack wrote: post #9
shostack wrote: post #2

I wonder if they'll find any hope with those trees left unscathed that are deemed "resistant." Also, with something like this, how do they remove the trees without the disease spreading in the process? I know when I go to prune bits of my roses that have black spot or rust, it can spread just by contact in the course of removal which can be damn near impossible to avoid. I can only imagine how that scales at tree siz…

I was thinking the same - eventually resistance develops.

Maybe, but we've seen some plant diseases pretty much eradicate the original species without them developing resistance. For example, the Panama disease (despite the massive resources of the banana industry) devastated the Gros Michel, and is now killing off the Cavendish.

Another example is phylloxera, which plagued Vitis vinifera (European grape) vines in the 1800s. And to this day, the only solution is to hybridize or graft them with American rootstock.

Re: Scientists say sudden oak death epidemic is no longer stoppable

#114

Post by j_s »

hasslein wrote: post #97
stevecalifornia wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not plant related, but equally fascinating: There used to be a lake bigger than Lake Tahoe in California between Fresno and Bakersfield. It It was the largest fresh water lake west of the Great Lakes (by surface area). It was drained for agriculture. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulare_Lake

I would highly recommend "Cadillac Desert: The American West and its Disappearing Water;" it goes into fair detail about Lake Tulare. Fascinating read.

Thanks for the recommendation! Linking here to make sure all the "HN Reads"-ish tools pick it up:

http://amzn.com/dp/B001RTKIUA

Re: Scientists say sudden oak death epidemic is no longer stoppable

#115

Post by [deleted] »

kingmanaz wrote: post #38
stevecalifornia wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not plant related, but equally fascinating: There used to be a lake bigger than Lake Tahoe in California between Fresno and Bakersfield. It It was the largest fresh water lake west of the Great Lakes (by surface area). It was drained for agriculture. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulare_Lake

For a good read on what happened to Lake Tulare, read "The King of California". The world's largest cotton plantation now sits in the lakebed and holds primary water rights. Pink sheet stock. Ticker BWEL.

[deleted]

Re: Scientists say sudden oak death epidemic is no longer stoppable

#116

Post by j_s »

kingmanaz wrote: post #38
stevecalifornia wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not plant related, but equally fascinating: There used to be a lake bigger than Lake Tahoe in California between Fresno and Bakersfield. It It was the largest fresh water lake west of the Great Lakes (by surface area). It was drained for agriculture. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulare_Lake

For a good read on what happened to Lake Tulare, read "The King of California". The world's largest cotton plantation now sits in the lakebed and holds primary water rights. Pink sheet stock. Ticker BWEL.

Kindle edition: http://amzn.com/dp/B0034XRFNK

Re: Scientists say sudden oak death epidemic is no longer stoppable

#117

Post by jp555 »

samstave wrote: post #108
losteric wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder how all these lost lakes impacted the regional climate

I've often thought about this. I've wondered; if we built a huge trench from the ocean into the Sahara desert, what would the environmental impact be??

I can imagine it would quickly be filled in by sand. The Sahara is a slow moving ocean of sand particles.

Re: Scientists say sudden oak death epidemic is no longer stoppable

#118

Post by caf »

callmeed wrote: post #100
danieltillett wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an Australian I find the CA eucalyptus very nostalgic. They are most certainly a fire hazard, but I am surprised to learn that they are considered useless for firewood. Here in Australia the best firewood is eucalyptus - it is a bastard to split though.

Yeah, it can work as firewood for heat if its thoroughly dried (1+ year). You have to split it before it dries. I guess I should clarify my previous post. Most people in CA don't burn wood for heat. I was specifically referring to burning wood for cooking (aka Santa Maria Style BBQ). For that, oak is superior and eucalyptus is a no-go.

I have long experience as a teenager splitting yellowbox eucalyptus for firewood - it splits considerably better when seasoned.

Re: Scientists say sudden oak death epidemic is no longer stoppable

#119

Post by pfarnsworth »

ArtDev wrote: post #92
pfarnsworth wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it no longer makes sense, since the scientists have already said that it's unstoppable. So dumping more money into trying to protect them seems like a waste of money, no?

Giving up is a very poor plan. Dead trees make wildfires much much worse. California wildfires are terrible as it is.

Forest fires are a natural part of the cycle. In fact, it's forest fire "prevention" that causes even bigger forest fires than normal. If they simply let fires burn, it would naturally cleanse the forests of brush and dead trees and create much smaller forest fires.

Re: Scientists say sudden oak death epidemic is no longer stoppable

#120

Post by hinkley »

mdip wrote: post #105

Years ago all of the oak trees in my area were cut down due to being killed by the Emerald Ash Borer, a beetle. Fines were imposed for exporting fire wood outside of the affected counties (a common thing to do in my state where people take their chopped logs up to their cabins for bonfires) but it did little to keep the bug from spreading further and further. Many of these trees were in large forests, but it's most n…

Something like this happened at my college, and one of my friends was in the forestry program.

He was so pissed because every time trees on campus got a disease, they'd cut them down and replace them all with a single species. So in 50 years when those trees got a disease, they had to cut them all down again.

So 50 years from now some maple disease will have your town cutting down all the trees all over again :/

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