several variables and the arborist’s own decision framework: •Will the tree decline or die without treatment? •What are the customer’s goals: aesthetic, survival or long-term management? •How sensitive is the species to phy- totoxicity or slow uptake? And, of course, weather and climate of a given region will always play a role. “Ultimately, arborists should absolutely not utilize a one-method, one-device ap- proach in all circumstances but rather be competent and have on hand a diver- sity of products and equipment,” Belter said. When choosing products and types of injection devices, the deciding factor should always be the desired outcome.
“Macro-infusions tend to run at a much lower pressure and are more oriented, for example, like an IV in one’s arm at the hospital,” he explained. “The goal is to introduce and allow it to infiltrate according to the tree’s natural photo- synthetic rate/vascular mobility. Micro, on the other hand, tends to be oriented to a very high pressure to ensure rapid injection of the solution in spite of what the tree’s vascular rate may be at.” While rare, cross-contamination could be an issue as well, especially for arbor- ists treating multiple trees in a single day without sterilizing the drill bits and equipment before each new injection. “You’re treating an ash tree to prevent it from getting emerald ash borer, but the ash tree before the one you’re doing now had ash yellows,” Cleveland said. “It can now be spread to the tree you’re treating.” At the end of the day, the choice of treatment ultimately comes down to
ourselves to ethical commitments sim- ilar to the Hippocratic oath that human doctors take,” Belter continued. “We should not make profits the ultimate factor determining how or with what we offer for plant health care.” THE FUTURE OF PHC: NEW TOOLS, NEW FORMULATIONS Where will the next evolution of plant health care take us? The industry is continually working on new formula- tions and new devices designed to treat trees more effectively, while reducing the impact on the environment (and hopefully saving some time and effort for the arborist as well). “We’re seeing more and more applica- tions for better, softer, gentler, kinder type of applications that deal more with the soil biota,” Stringfellow said. One example is Quest’s Reliant Sys- temic Fungicide, a phosphite-based product that Stringfellow compares
“We as ‘tree doctors’ should also hold
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