what happens after the ROD

[shockwave rider]

quote:

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Originally posted by terracore

The American chestnut was also around for millions of years, and occupied a much larger land area (over 200 million acres). The fastest-growing hardwood, it was the main forest tree of the Eastern US, and what we made ships, houses, furniture, flooring, etc out of until a blight imported from an Asian ornamental chestnut species came in and wiped them all out. The only survivors are a few tiny areas that never got the blight, and some infected, disfigured sickly trees. Over a hundred years of selective breeding has yet to yield a resistant tree.

Hopefully, the Ohia do better.

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One of the things that doomed the American Chestnut was their high commercial value, as the blight took hold loggers went out and cut every American Chestnut they could find in a very short time. So virtually no live trees were left, creating a genetic bottle neck even smaller than the one the disease was creating. There were so few trees left from which resistant trees could arise that the American Chestnut had no chance. If native chestnut hadn't been "harvested" so quickly there might have been a chance for a population of resistant chestnuts to get a toehold, but virtually all the trees were cut down before that got a chance to happen.

If anyone wants an example of everything NOT to do to stop the spread of ROD, the Hilo-Keaau highway clearing project is a textbook case. When I commuted through HPP to Hilo everyday I was watching acre after acre of Ohia dying, then I would get on the highway and along with half of Hawaii county I would drive past the highway clearing project. There was no effort made to reduce the spread of ROD along that corridor, instead trees were bulldozed into piles, the piles of dead trees and dirt were constantly being pushed around, no dead trees were covered as recommended, and there are still many dead standing Ohias in the median today.

[Guest]

Right on shockwave rider, mahalo.

I couldn't have wrote the truth about the careless spread of ROD in that area and many other areas any better than you described it. To leave the dead ohia trees standing for so long after the clearing to further spread the ROD spores didn't make any sense. A few of those Ohia trees may have lived through this ROD outbreak "IF" the Bulldozing, chainsaws, boots, and vehicle's were kept out of there to begin with. Jmo.

[kalakoa]

There was no effort made to reduce the spread of ROD along that corridor

Feral pigs spread ROD. No effort is made to control them either.

[ElysianWort]

Twice, right there in the Panaewa stretch I did see the state efficiently spending our tax dollars while trying to prevent the spread of ROD: It was weeks after the trees were dead and the piles of dirt and dead trees were being moved. There were about 12 workers all decked out with reflective vests and hardhats standing around watching one other person use the chainsaw and cut the ROD infected trees.

[Justin]

I have a couple of ideas on this.

1) In areas where trees have already died, we need to start re-foresting ASAP with other trees, so that Albizia and Spathodea and Miconia don't take over. There are hundreds if not thousands of tree species growing all over this island, and dozens if not hundreds of them would grow well and re-forest in relatively short order while not going crazy like Albizia. Preferably, a wide variety of trees would be used, as it would prevent the problems present with a monoculture, and also give more variety of food to the birds and other native animals on the island that feed on Ohia leaves and flowers.

2) Simultaneously, do research on Ohia hybrids, grafts, etc. based on other members of the Metrosideros family. I asked JB Friday at a meeting in Leilani about a year ago if ceratocystis was impacting the other members of the family, and he said no. So to me, repopulating swaths of the forest with Metrosideros collina (which grows in the Marquesas) and Metrosideros excelsa (which grows in New Zealand) would be very easy in terms of having the birds and other animals quickly adapt. It might also lead to natural hybridizing among the various Metrosideros species on the island, which would help in terms of diversifying the gene pool and helping against future diseases and pests.

3) Research the trees that survived in stands of dead trees and see whether they actually were pest-resistant, or just lucky. If pest resistant, we should get as many seeds, cuttings, tissue cultures, etc. and start growing thousands or millions of these ASAP.

4) Don't just sit around waiting, pointing fingers. It does nothing to bring the trees back, and does nothing to repopulate the forest.

[kalakoa]

where trees have already died, we need to start re-foresting ASAP ... Don't just sit around waiting, pointing fingers.

Pretty much my point -- I see lots of "figure out who to blame instead of doing something about the problem", all over the island, at all levels of government, and it's not productive or helpful.

[HereOnThePrimalEdge]

Don't just sit around waiting, pointing fingers.

Last January, DLNR organized an island wide mapping of the ohia die off:

Using a helicopter and specialized survey equipment, surveyors from a collaboration of state, county and federal agencies flew January 11 – 15, 2016. ... “We used two surveyors at a time and flew a total of 8 ½ hours over state, federal and private lands covering about two-thirds of the Big Islands’s ohia forests.

Individuals could use the map to develop a personal response to the die off (some good suggestions above), or residents in affected areas may wish to find out what the DLNR and state intend to do next. Or if they intend to do anything. More info and detailed map:

http://www.bigislandvideonews.com/2016/0...n-thought/

“There are worse crimes than burning books. One of them is not reading them.”
-Joseph Brodsky

[kalakoa]

Last January, DLNR organized an island wide mapping of the ohia die off

A survey of the damage is useful, still waiting for DLNR to ... take constructive action.

[kalakoa]

To clarify: not "waiting" for DNLR where my "private" property is concerned, but hoping there's a "rule clarification" so that any ad-hoc reforestation efforts are not met with prosecution.

Not that they've bothered where other relevant problems exist (aibizia).

[Guest]

The transcontinental transport of soil and infected plants got us into this mess by giving obscure plant pathogens rides across oceans on jet planes.

Modern GMO technology can fix it. Instead of abandoned, weed filled papaya fields, we have a thriving GMO papaya export industry here. Obviously, many if not most people here would prefer abandoned, weed filled fields and idle farm workers collecting benefits. Thriving GMO papaya fields have even been attacked by chainsaws at night. When people have an easy life, with the assumption that someone else will always provide for them, they attack solutions to problems as 'ideologically unacceptable'.

When the only solution is held up as an ideological bogyman, your only option is to sit and watch disaster unfold. You can only have so many simultaneously unfolding disasters with 'ideologically unacceptable' solutions before your whole world collapses people.

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You can't fix Samsara.