To view and download the official document:

http://www.treesearch.fs.fed.us/pubs/4424
 


A PHOTO GUIDE

to the patterns of

DISCOLORATION AND DECAY

in living northern hardwood trees

by Alex L. Shigo & Edwin vH. Larson

U.S.D.A. FOREST SERVICE RESEARCH PAPER NE-127 1969

NORTHEASTERN FOREST EXPERIMENT STATION, UPPER DARBY, PA. FOREST SERVICE, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE RICHARD D. LANE, DIRECTOR


The Authors

ALEX L. SHIGO, plant pathologist, is in charge of a special U.S. Forest Service project for research in discoloration and decay of living trees, headquartered at the Northeastern Forest Experiment Station's research unit at Durham, N. H.  A graduate of Waynesburg College, Waynesburg, Pa., in 1956, he received his Masters degree in 1958 and his Ph.D. degree in plant pathology in 1959 at West Virginia University.  He joined the U.S. Forest Service in 1959.

EDWIN vH. LARSON, editor, is chief of publications at the Northeastern Forest Experiment Station, Upper Darby, Pa.  A graduate of Rutgers University in 1936 with a Bachelor of Letters degree, he worked for 6 years as a feature writer and copy editor on a daily newspaper, and 4 years in the U.S. Army as a training film scenario writer at The Infantry School and overseas as a prisoner of war interrogator and intelligence staff officer.  He joined the U.S. Forest Service in 1947.


A PHOTO GUIDE

to the patterns of

DISCOLORATION AND DECAY

in living northern hardwood trees
---- ---- ---- ----

Contents

HOW CAN YOU TELL? .........................1

STUDY METHODS & MATERIALS.......2
    The species.............................................3
    The methods...........................................3
    Scope of the studies................................4

GENERAL RESULTS................................4
    A succession of organisms......................4
    A consistent pattern................................4
    Discoloration not heartwood...................5

THE PROCESSES OF DISCOLORATION
    AND DECAY..........................................5
    Stage 1..................................................... 5
    Stage 2......................................................6
    Stage 3......................................................7
    Importance of time...................................7

THE PATTERNS OF DISCOLORATION
    AND DECAY..........................................8
   
Central column.........................................8
    Multiple columns......................................9
    Defects under cankers..............................11
    Mineral streak and stain........................... 11
    Other patterns...........................................12

EFFECTS ON DIFFERENT SPECIES.........12
    Sugar maple...............................................12
    Red maple..................................................12
    Yellow birch...............................................13
    Paper birch.................................................13
    Beech.........................................................13
    Ash.............................................................13

 STUBS WITHIN THE STEM.......................14
    How to estimate size, angle, and depth......14

PHOTO GUIDE.............................................17

WHAT TO LOOK FOR.................................81
    Branch stubs...............................................81
    Stem stubs...................................................81
    Sprout clumps and branch stubs.................82
    Decay-causing fungi...................................82
    Logging wounds..........................................86
    Sugar maple borer.......................................87
    Sapsucker wounds......................................88
    Cambium miner..........................................89
    Squirrel wounds..........................................89
    Ambrosia beetles........................................89
    Seams and frost cracks...............................90
    Nectria canker............................................90
    Eutypella canker.........................................91
    Burls and swollen stems.............................91
    Fire wounds................................................91
    Beech bark disease.....................................91
    Bleeding cankers........................................92
    Stem borers................................................92
    Sun scald....................................................93
    Hypoxylon species.....................................93

RECOMMENDATIONS...............................94
    General.......................................................94
    Mature trees...............................................95
    Sprout clumps.............................................95
    Young trees.................................................95
    Pruning........................................................96
    The stand.....................................................96

INDEX............................................................99


Acknowledgments
   
Many people helped in various ways to make this guide possible.  Their help is gratefully acknowledged:  Edward Sharon, David Houston, William Waters, Marvin Fowler, Robert Brandt, Victor Jensen, Gerald Wheeler, Elmer Kelso, Verland Ohlson, Robert Lucas, and George Yelenosky.


We broke this doc down to 4 sections.

Pages 1-25

Pages 26-50

Pages 51-75

Pages 76-100  plus back cover message.


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