I actually keep planting white ash seedlings - Hope springs eternal! There are ash species in Asia (that's where EAB actually started), but I don't know how they compare to our species. I don't mind if an ash dies - They're fast growing, and make excellent firewood. I do hope SOME sort of natural control can be discovered to save yet another of our trees from the brink of extinction. Sometimes I worry that pretty soon, there's going to be no native trees left! Oak wilt, chestnut blight, beech scale, dutch elm disease, emerald ash borer, hemlock wooly adelgid... Where's the list going to stop?

The world is always going to end in a clataclysm of epic proportions. I can't stop it and I can't afford the therapy...so, que sera, sera.

As far as a replacement in a similar size to F. americana, with the fall color from a seedling grown tree, not sure there is one.

I have seen various shades of purple to orange on sweet gum. Highly variable, some individuals may only be purple, some only orange, some may present both, usually in cascades as the season progresses.

Viburnum lentago. Kinda hard to get too excited about nannyberry, but it has good purple color, but a multistemmed shrub just lacks the cache of a tree.

some of the oaks have remarkable fall color. Usually more bronzes and reds and yellows, not familiar with too many cultivars selected for fall color, but what I have implies there is room for selection if one is patient.

There is nearly infinite variety in color of some of the smaller statured maples. Sure, there's a. griseum, usually reliable, a. triflorum, anything but reliable, but individuals can be stunning, and then you hit the asiatics...one of my favorites has to be a. pseudosieboldianum

Fraxinus mandschurica is somewhat resistant but only has a vibrant yellow fall color.

Here is a link that might be useful: {{gwi:464388}}

I think the key lies not in resistant trees, but natural biological controls. That said, Blue Ash (Fraxinus quadrangulata) is apparently less attractive to the EAB.

What about Black ash (F. nigra)? Anything about its susceptibility?

That's a good question, Jimbob. Black ash makes up a great deal of the understory of the wetter parts of my northern woods. But what I really like are the white ash growing in mesic conditions all over E. Wisconsin woods. Just today, for example, I was in a deep, heavily wooded ravine right here in my town. The woods overstory contains everything from some giant old cottonwoods through oaks, red, swamp white, burr and white, sugar maple, red elm, black cherry, and white ash. Numerous white ash saplings are coming up happily in that understory. Gawd, I'd hate to think they don't have time.

+oM

Black ash seem just as succeptible as other native Fraxinus species. Here in Minnesota there is some hope that colder winters may slow down EAB or force it into more semivoltine life cycles (more than one year per life cycle). Most of the black ash in our state is in the northern half, which is good news IF there is anything to the temperature hypothesis. Currently there is research underway to assess what the loss of black ash would do to N. Minnesota's hydrology, animal habitat, and hardwood forest succession. I know there is also research ongoing to find resistance genes in ash, but so far: nothing.

Thanks Go. Yes, where my black ash are, and others in the state, is the N. half or that narrow strip down along L. Michigan that thinks it's up north. Kinda cool trees though I'm not specifically managing for them on my land.

I agree with Smivies that the best hope lies in some natural control. I do wonder just how bad EAB will treat us here in WI. It does look quite bad but then so did the gypsy moth. In that case, infestation front zones were indeed hit hard. But now, having gone through that, it's become just another annoying pest out there, rarely really pounding the whole area all that much. Hey, I can always hope.

+oM

It may end up like elms. The only elms I can grow here are pure Siberian or Chinese elms -- both from areas where DED & elm yellows originated. Hope it doesn't come to that.

It's interesting that the white ash, with its redish fall color, seems a bit tougher/survives a bit longer. The neighbours on either side of us have green ashs that are declining badly, while our white ash is still pretty strong. There was an interesting note in a recent RHS (Royal Horticultural Society in the UK) The Garden magazine talking about the latest thinking on why European trees have yellow fall color while North American trees have a lot of orange and red fall color. The red appears to be linked to a stronger evolved ability to fight off insect pests - of which there are more in North America (and Asia).... I can't find an on-line version of what was in the RHS magazine, but the linked article covers the same ground. If that theory is true, perhaps it's the red pigments in the white ash that gives it some greater resistance to EAB.

Our white ash showing above the roof yesterday - our first hard frost day:
{{gwi:173376}}

Here is a link that might be useful: yellow vs. red fall color

Thanks for that link, Woody. Not sure I'm buying it but a good read all the same. My biggest issue is the fact that if anthocyanins are there to repel insects, why would they arise at the very end of the growing season, and at the very end of these leaves' lives? Plus, to cite one example of the opposite situation, reddish-colored fl. crab varieties appear to be noticeably more attractive to some pests, Japanese beetle for one. Of course, maybe that's a poor example in that the insect evolved in a different part of the world-to some extent anyway-than did the host plant.

As a forestry department, we at work were right on top of the EAB situation as it first appeared in MI. I remember back then that there was already some thought that white ash was looking a little less susceptible than were other ash species. But if I'm not mistaken, other reports began to surface later that this was not the case. Anyone have anything to add regarding that? Green ash can be very decent trees, and were formerly a kind of workhorse species, but I'd be lying if I didn't say it's the white ash that I most hate to see decimated. Such great trees they are.

+oM

Perhaps what the red pigments at the end of the season do is provide protection against overwintering larval stages. That would make sense given the red coloring for Scandanavian shrubs that survive with insects under the snow. DH wore me down and we had the ash treated in early August. They obviously drilled one of the holes deeper than the others and there has been sap leakage there - the sap is very obviously red! We had almost an inch of rain overnight so the colors are all darker in this picture than they would be if it was dry - when it's dry, the red is more obvious, but I think you can see it here:
{{gwi:464392}}

I'd say the best thing to do would be to keep planting ash seedlings - Sometime, a resistant one's got to crop up. Around here, EAB seems to be affecting the street tree and lawn tree ashes - Ones in the woods behind our house show nary a sign of decline.

Again, interesting observation. When gypsy moth came through here big time, it was also park and yard trees what got et up. Stuff in the woods, hardly at all. Word then was that in those wilder places there were sufficient deer mice to eat the larvae. Don't know if that was true, but something caused a huge difference, just as you are reporting for EAB.

As far as planting white ash, there are already lots of them coming up. They just have to be able to continue living.

+oM

What can I do to protect the two 20 year old green ash I have in my back yard? Bear tree&shrub defense was suggested but the thought of dumping 5-10 5g buckets of the stuff around the tree. Sounds pretty arguious as a yearly task. If that's all I can do thought, then so be it.

Just want to add one little bit to the Ash discussion. About a year ago, I was looking online for info on the state of possible biological control of EAB. I found something interesting, even though nobody seemed to be particularly bold in their statements about it. In a couple areas where it's thought EAB had been present the longest, the native predators to the native Bronze Ash Borer appeared to be becoming more effective at attacking EAB. In fact the rate of attach had increased from one year to the next. BUT this was a small sample size of two years, and from just two locations. However predation was above 50%, far exceeding the previous reported predation by these predators of 1-2% at most. This actually make a co-evolutionary sense. If the number of borers are reduced to reduction of host Ash trees, and what is reproducing most effectively is the invasive EAB (due to a lack of predators), then any BAB's that happen to be able to attack EAB should be reproductively favored. Assuming this is correct, then the incidence of BAB predators that are capable of become effective predators of EAB should increase relatively quickly. Over a period of time Ash populations would bounce back, with populations of Ash Borer predators specialized to either EAB, or BAB.

Hopefully, the adaptation of native predators is in fact occuring, and combined with introduced predators, result in effective biological control. I have not yet looked this year for more reports. BTW, the two sites were both in Michigan.

Arktrees

Woodyoak, realizing that it may be the lesser of two evils, I sure hate to see injections into any tree because of the potential infection at the entry wound. But I think you are right about white ashes' seeming toughness.

My Autumn Purple has been "entry wounded" beyond belief. I have identified infestations of red headed ash borer, ash-lilac borer, flat headed apple borer and three years ago a heavy attack by eastern ash bark beetle. I gave up any type of chemical treatment years ago thinking that if it were to succumb I would replace it with something other than Fraxinus.

{{gwi:464395}}

But, this particular tree has stood tall against evertything thrown at it. It has never lost a major branch. I have to share +oM's hope that EAB will find trees with resistance like this one and meet its match, at least allowing the species to continue with some normality. EAB is creeping into KS and undoubtably will get here as another test for this tree. Until then I'll just keep enjoying it in autumn!
hortster

{{gwi:464396}}

horster - yeah - I was none too keen on the treatment, especially after seeing that sap dripping out! DH really hates the thought of losing the tree; I'd just use it as an opportunity to plant something else of interest! The treatment needs doing again in two years - I'm very reluctant to do it again. Some of the whatever-it-was also leaked out of the holes and you can see that it wiped out the lichen whereever it touched it. So it's pretty strong stuff! I hope the local predators step in to balance things as arktrees' info suggests. I really worry that this treatment could be making the tree more vulnerable than it was to begin with!

I do not mean to go too OT here, but does anyone have an online source for Autumn Purple that is not fastgrowingtrees.com expensive or is this a tree due to EAB that has lost favor in the nursery trade and no longer widely available?

John

Are there not soil-drench formulations of Bayer-type, or imidaclopyralid insecticide available? Or am I mis-reading? All the products I know of are soil drench, not trunk inject.

Ark, I understand what you're saying and fervently hope it pans out. But did you perchance mean to write bronze birch borer, not bronze ash borer? I believe EAB is related to BBB, but I've not heard of bronze ash borer. (Doesn't mean it doesn't exist!)

+oM

The difference, though, between BBB and EAB is that Bronze Birch Borer is opportunistic, attacking sick trees. Actually, in healthy birches, sap fills the borer holes and drowns them. We are supposed to be extremely susceptible to BBB around here, yet my brother has a perfectly healthy, 40-year old plus European white birch. Admittedly, it is in a fairly wet spot.

OT, but possibly of use!

Tom,
Did a bit of looking back, and probable do have a couple things crossed a bit. I'm certain the native host of the native parasitoid was in the same genus, as I thought about it making sense that there would be a low rate of parasitism, and that it would make sense for a specialized population to develop as selection pressures increased. I have a very strong tendency to remember "the take home message", and do away with allot of the details unless they contradict or are an exception the take home message.

Check the link below, as their is a bit of information about what I wrote yesterday. However here is an except:

"Since completion of this early work on EAB natural enemies, MSU collaborators have found high levels of parasitism by A. hicorae, an incidental larval ectoparasitoid of EAB, in a heavily-infested state park north of the Detroit area. We are now collaborating with MSU and FS to develop a rearing method for this parasitic wasp. Other scientists in the U.S. and Canada are beginning to study EAB natural enemies, and are finding P. sulcata and B. indica also reach high levels in some sites. High prevalence of these parasitoids, however, tends to occur in stands where the majority of the ash trees have already died."

This is IMO exactly what you would expect to find if already present parasitoids were adapting to attract the new invasive. You would first see it in localized areas, where selection pressure is highest (i.e. where most ash trees have already been killed). This is not unlike what is happening hospitals where overuse of antibiotics are occuring.

Lastly, in the link there is a small section of fungal pathogens of which I was not previously aware. Basically, high EAB mortality found at individual sites due to various isolates of fungi. Again, what you would expect to see if the fungi were adapting to attack EAB. That does not preclude, that it could be local environmental conditions, or some other factor, but it does suggest the possibility.

All this IMO, suggests that biological control will eventually be established through various mechanisms.

Arktrees

Here is a link that might be useful: Control of EAB

John,
I think there are a couple of B&B Autumn Purple Ash here in NW Arkansas, but I have not paid attention to their condition or price. The only only online supplier that I can think of is Sooner Plant Farm, and they only have those listed, and not in stock. I have seen them listed on Sander's Nursery website in Inola, OK as well. No ideal of size or condition. No doubt they are much more difficult to locate now.I have read many accounts of how demand plummeted with the spread of EAB.

Arktrees

wisconsitom - the treatment used around here is Treeazin, which is injected under the bark - see link below...

Here is a link that might be useful: Treeazin

smivies is correct that blue ash is apparently less attractive to EAB. In fact, the experts are saying that in the presence of EAB blue ash seems to be able to "persist and resist", based on studies in southern Ontario & SE Michigan.

As whaas indicated, Manchurian ash has resistance, but it generally has straight yellow fall color. Chinese ash (F chinensis) may also have some resistance to EAB (not yet confirmed as far as I know) and could have the potential to develop fall color similar to white ash.

They do make imidicloprid (Bayer) in tablet form now, just simply dig a little hole and drop them in.

FWIW, I've planted both green and white ash here at my place on the AL/FL state line. I have no idea if the EAB will make it this far south, but my trees are pretty well isolated from other Ash trees since I'm surrounded by Ash-less pine plantations. There's a few green ash and pumpkin ash along the major rivers and in swamps, but otherwise they're just not common at all down here. I never see an Ash tree planted in anyone's yard or by municipalities.

To get my Green Ash seeds, I actually had to venture into the swamp along the Tensaw River, and I had to buy my White Ash trees online since I'm almost out of its native range.

Then I learn there is yet another Ash disease almost wiping them out in the whole of Europe. There needs to be tight controls to keep it from arriving in North America.

Arktrees

Here is a link that might be useful: Fungal Ash Disease

"Then I learn there is yet another Ash disease almost wiping them out in the whole of Europe. There needs to be tight controls to keep it from arriving in North America"

Yep, it's very worrying. And compounded by government inaction here until 6 years after the disease was known about; it's too late now, classic shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted. Make sure your govt. takes action on banning imports a.s.a.p. (ideally, not later than last year).

Resin

Yes, you do not want that disease. Almost all ash trees are sick and dying in my part of sweden, it happend extremely fast. Dutch elm disease has arrived here only recently, it is slow going. But that ash disease swept forth like fire.

Insects can be controlled; disease is much more difficult. Think chestnut blight, dutch elm disease, oak wilt, laurel wilt, this wilt, that wilt...