Tree Disease Plagues Mandan | Video

Joel Porter | 7/31/2012

North Dakota`s elm trees are under attack, and today, Mandan was on the battle ground. City workers in Mandan are cutting down dozens of infected trees.

This summer, city forester Barry Kiemele has tagged 135 trees infected with Dutch Elm Disease. He says the majority of those are in parks and along city maintained property. The problem, he says, is that there are simply too many infected trees for the city to handle.

He says the best way to prevent the spread of the disease is to cut down and remove the tree right away.

Kiemele says the disease is caused by a fungus spread by the European Elm Bark Beetle.

He says he believes the mild winter allowed the beetle population to explode.

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