Heat, bugs and disease have taken a toll on pine trees this summer.
"If it's brown, cut it down."
Sadly, that's about the only advice Douglas County extension agent Bruce Chladny has for people with evergreen problems.
It is advice he's been handing out more regularly this year as pine trees in the county are succumbing to a lethal combination of disease, bugs and drought.
"We've had a really rough summer," Chladny said.
Donna Osness didn't need to be told.
She is reminded every time she looks out her window at 1654 University Drive.
Osness, who is on the extension's executive council, has been forced to remove four of her 12 giant Ponderosa pines.
"We're going to miss them," she said. "What we're hoping is we're not going to lose all of them."
Osness' trees were victims of pine borer.
Other trees have suffered from diseases like tip blight and needle blight, Chladny said.
Those diseases seem to be taking a toll on the Scotch and Austrian pines in particular, he said.
The two trees were a popular choice 20 to 30 years ago for wind breaks and foundation plantings.
But as they've aged, they've become more susceptible to disease, Chladny said.
Compounding the problems this summer was the weather.
Heavy rains in the spring weakened the root systems. The hot, dry summer did further damage, Chladny said.
Chladny said there is some hope for trees that haven't gone completely brown.
Fungicides can control the disease. Insecticides can control the borers.
Either treatment should be sprayed in the spring before the killers become active, Chladny said.
But the diagnosis ought to be made soon. Chladny recommended bringing a sample branch with both brown and green needles to the extension office at the Douglas County 4-H Fairgrounds to find out the problem.
But, he said, a brown needle will never return to green and might as well be cut out and thrown away.
For trees that are lost, Chladny recommended replacement with cedars, spruces or white pines, which don't suffer as much from diseases and insects.
Austrian, Scotch or Ponderosa pines are fine, too, if you don't need the tree to last more than a couple decades.
"Don't get too attached to it," Chladny said.
-- Kendrick Blackwood's phone message number is 832-7221. His e-mail address is kblackwood@ljworld.com.
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