"Sunflower" wrote in message
...

"Me" wrote in message
om...
Any advice? My new yard has some beautiful plants that were neglected
by the former owner. The dogwood is about 40 feet tall and the upper
third looks pretty healthy. The lower branches and leaves are quite
damaged by the disease although the trunk looks fine.

I've read about prevention (which I wish had been exercised here) and
control, but I'm not sure if it's a lost cause. Anyone have
experience combatting this disease? Should I spend a few years trying
to revive this tree or should I begin thinking about what to put in
its place?

Many thanks,
Samantha

Even if you choose to try fungicides to come to a stalemate with the
fungus,
the tree will always remain infected and the dead and diseased portions
will
not renew themselves. Injecting fungicide is expensive, and it only
delays
the inevitible. I would personally take it down now before it could
infect
any other dogwoods in the area (if that hasn't happened already) and
replace
it with something else. No sense wasting a couple of hundred bucks a year
on something that can't be cured anyway, and if it's that tall, is
probably
already near the end of it's shorter lifespan anyway.

I agree with Sunflower. IME, only quite young trees are able to bounce back
well from this problem and that requires both a diligent program of cultural
control as well as regular spraying of fungicides. If the tree is heavily
infected, it is only a matter of time before the disease takes its toll,
regardless of how methodical you are about spraying - the fungicides are
just not that effective and very difficult to apply thoroughly and with
sufficient regularity on a tree of that size.

Other than selecting resistant species and hybrids for planting from the
outset, I'd be interested to know what you learned about prevention - it is
nearly impossible to *prevent* a fungal infection, but many can be
controlled through management, depending on the problem. And there is a huge
difference between prevention and control. FWIW, there are very few
reputable nurseries in this area that even offer Cornus florida (or our
native C. nuttalli) for sale any more other than a very limited number of
more resistant cultivars as the disease is so prevelent and widespread.

pam - gardengal