WELCOME BACK

NEW DAY DAWNING

HYBRID ELM TREE

Thursday, 9:00 AM.  56 degrees F at the ferry dock, 53 on the back porch.  Wind variable, light with moderate gusts.  The sky is clear, the humidity 59%.  The barometer is rising, now at 29.77", predicting seasonally mild temperatures and clear skies for much of the next ten day, with chances of rain next Tuesday and Friday.  Marvelous weather!

   Dutch Elm disease devastated American cities fifty years and more ago.  It is an old story that doesn't need to be retold here, except to say that after all that time the elm is returning to our cities, either as highly resistant American elm selections, which have basically the familiar vase-shape of the street trees that were so loved of old, or as hybrid trees that are  immune to the disease.  It should be noted that "highly resistant" trees still can be vulnerable, and the hybrids do not have the vase-shape of the American Elm. I cannot recommend one above another of the hybrids.  It should be noted that some of the hybrids grow so fast that keeping them properly training pruned can be a problem.

   In any case, elms are back as street and landscape trees, and all are basically cold hardy and fast growing, and this fall at least are very colorful.  Welcome back!