Sudden Oak Death

[Ernie_Wise]

Anybody else catch this on the BBC this morning? Has it had any effect orienteering?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-12135822

[ifor]

This is a fungus desise and is spread by the spores. It has led to the closure of one of the MTB trails at Afan Argod South Wales. The FC want mountain bikers to be carefull to clean there bikes well so as to try and stop the spread of the spores. Here is a link to the document about the Afan problem.

http://www.afanforestpark.co.uk/pdf/Lat ... amorum.pdf]

I only found out about this after rideing the closed trail in the dark. There was no indication why it was closed and I assumed it was just standard forestry working wanting to keep the bikers off for H&S so in the dark there would be no realy problem so I ignored the signs. Only found the reason a couple of weeks later.

For O I would expect no access to an infected area. I think we should be takeing precautions to stop the spreading of spores e.g. washing clothes and more importantly shoes well between going from one event to another in a different forest.

BO should be being proactive with the landowners and coming up with some guidelines.

[Scott]

Handn't heard of it before. Was thinking of planting a couple thousand acorns on my land this fall, but maybe not now. What is causing it? A weedlike brush around my place has been taking over for years until this year when an insect has almost wiped it out. I wonder what plant it will attack next year? Is this insect from further south and has just reached here because of the warmer average temperatures I wonder?

The spambots really are getting rather clever