MIDLAND, Texas — Oak wilt is a disease that can make short work of any oak trees it affects in an area.
"It's a fungus that attacks the vessels, the water bearing vessels of a tree, an oak tree. And what the oak tree does is it plugs those vessels to stop the disease but in return what it does is that it ends up choking itself," Jeremy West, owner of Casa Verde Nursery in Midland, said. "Having a lack of water to continue to grow and to function the way that it's supposed to."
Oak wilt can spread by the transport of firewood and through invasive insects that can carry the fungus.
So, what do you do if you have an oak tree that you think is infected? Unfortunately, there isn’t much you can do.
“There’s really no cure for oak wilt and that’s really the tragic part of it," West said. "Once the tree has it, I mean it’s a matter months before it dies.”
But there are measures you can take to protect your oak trees before an infection occurs.
“They can do a preventative fungicide treatment, usually like a fungicide injection," West said. "Depositing capsules or injections into the tree by drilling into the tree and it spreads the fungicide within the vessels of the tree and that can help a healthy tree to fight it off.”
The Texas A&M Forest Service said while firewood is an important commodity in the fall and winter, Texans can help prevent the spread of these diseases and pests by buying, collecting and burning firewood locally.