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Phytophthora ramorum first surfaced in America and is known there as Sudden Oak death, responsible for a massive number of tree deaths amongst species of American oak. In 2002, a fungus was discovered on a viburnum plant is a Sussex garden and identified as Phytophthora ramorum. Since then, the plague has spread at an incredibly fast rate and is jumping species, with the English oak, around 100 other tree species and even rhododendrons falling prey to the pathogen.
Phytophthora ramorum affects tree bark, causing lesions which bleed black fluid, followed by blackening foliage and the death of the tree. According to the National Trust, this tree plague is far worse than Dutch Elm disease as the spores are now reproducing at an incredibly fast rate in one of England's commonest trees, the Japanese larch.
The only solution, it seems, is to cut down millions of trees in the worst-affected areas in an attempt to stop the spread of the disease. Four million trees, mainly in the West Country and Wales, scenes of the worst outbreaks, are now being removed. Former Japanese larch plantations run by the Forestry Commission are now acres of bare earth with huge stacks of bare tree trunks awaiting removal. Computer models are being used to predict what the disease will do next.
Scientists are also concerned about a new disease attacking the English oak and referred to as Acute Oak Decline. At present, only a small number of oak trees in southern England have been affected but the Forestry Commission is taking no chances. Biosecurity measures have been introduced at all infected sites, with workers and even ramblers with dogs instructed to thoroughly wash themselves - and their dogs - after they leave the area.
that this could hit politicians and psychos - now there would be an amazing grace.