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{{gwi:457124}}

{{gwi:457125}}

That's wood rot fungi, not good news. Unfortunately it's difficult to know how bad it is until the tree finally dies or blows over. Was the tree wounded?

I pruned the tree in the spring. The limbs were far above the trunk where the fungus is growing. The tree appears to be healthy except for the funjus.

I took the wood rot fungi off with a spade. The bark and intial 1/4 inch of wood shaved off easily. The infected wood is spongy. I know the infection is much larger than indicated by the growths. I wonder how long it will stand before it will fall?

tm

There is no way to determine how long until the tree fails structurally due to this invasion of the fungi. As you've noted, the tree can remain healthy even though this is happening. This is due to trees' ability to wall off infection internally, but in time, these walls can fail.

The biggest factor in any decision you make is whether there are "targets", ie. houses, sandboxes where kids play, etc. directly underneath the trees. If the answer is no, it may be reasonable to live with them for a time to come before removal. It's really up to how much risk you can live with.

+oM