Ash trees

[Catweazle]

Perhaps the Woodland Trust should reconsider their policy of opening as many woods as possible to the public, at least temporarily.

One pair of boots owned by an enthusiastic rambler with a car can spread disease a long way.

[energy-village]

Odd? Comes from having a parliament with only two MPs who have had a career as professional scientists and a government that pays little heed to science on many issues.

Yep. I notice that most of the Chinese leadership seem to be engineers, Britain's tend to be:

(1) Professional politicians with little or no work experience.
(2) Lawyers.
(3) Bankers.

[biffvernon]

One pair of boots owned by an enthusiastic rambler with a car can spread disease a long way.

Is there any evidence that this happens? There seems to be a lack of knowledge about it. This from the Forestry Commission:

Ash trees were first recorded dying in large numbers from what is now believed to be this newly identified form of ash dieback in Poland in 1992, and it spread rapidly to other European countries. However, it was 2006 before the fungus’s asexual stage, C. fraxinea, was first “described” by scientists, and 2010 before its sexual stage, Hymenoscyphus pseudo-albidus, was described. It is believed to have entered Great Britain on plants for planting imported from nurseries in Continental Europe. However, now that we have found infected older trees in East Anglia with no apparent connection with nursery stock, we are also investigating the possibility that it might have entered Britain by natural means. These include being carried on the wind or on birds coming across the North Sea, or on items such as footwear, clothing or vehicles of people who had been in infected sites in Continental Europe.

And a thoughtful piece from Tobias Jones in the Observer:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree ... sh-dieback

[biffvernon]

The government also ignored the Forestry Commission's warning that there was no money to tackle tree disease and cut its cash by 25%, forcing seven offices to close and cutting 250 staff. You simply can't trust this incompetent Tory-led government with the nation's forests.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2 ... sh-disease

[Catweazle]

One pair of boots owned by an enthusiastic rambler with a car can spread disease a long way.

Is there any evidence that this happens? There seems to be a lack of knowledge about it.

I don't know of any evidence for this disease, but phytophthora was spread on boots, tools, vehicles.

[biffvernon]

Seems there's a lot to learn but here's a couple of minutes of botany:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=p ... f8fll_DWOM

[JavaScriptDonkey]

Fungal infections like stem rust are often wind borne so I suspect that the result of any import ban at this stage will be minimal.

We'd be probably better advised to pour the money into genetic research to find/create a resistant strain.

Of course that would only be a temporary solution, evolution being what it is.

[biffvernon]

Research? If only we had governments that took science seriously.

[JavaScriptDonkey]

Why does government need to fund the research?

Dig deep Biff old boy, dig deep.

[biffvernon]

I pay my taxes and vote for the party that would raise them higher.

(As I've said before, the last time you raised that silly point.)

[JavaScriptDonkey]

You don't have to wait to be taxed Biff, you can just write a cheque and send it to the Forestry Commission.

Or is it other people's money you are rushing to spend again?

[Little John]

You don't have to wait to be taxed Biff, you can just write a cheque and send it to the Forestry Commission.

Or is it other people's money you are rushing to spend again?

Do you have a problem with central taxation in principle or merely central taxation for things you don't like?

I'm not being deliberately provocative here JSD. I'm genuinely wishing to know the answer to the above question

[JavaScriptDonkey]

You don't have to wait to be taxed Biff, you can just write a cheque and send it to the Forestry Commission.

Or is it other people's money you are rushing to spend again?

Do you have a problem with central taxation in principle or merely central taxation for things you don't like?

I'm not being deliberately provocative here JSD. I'm genuinely wishing to know the answer to the above question

Why are you limiting the question to just two possible outcomes? I might be very left wing and be in favour of increased central taxation for everybody else besides me.

As it happens like most people I dislike all taxation.

Some taxation is essential to maintain the infrastructure and resources of our society but I would dearly like the spending decisions for those essentials removed from the pocket of the politicians.

Increased taxation gives Governments far too much money to spend and with that comes too much power to influence the electorate and buy their way in to long terms of office.

Taxation should be minimal and Government coffers not viewed as some bottomless pit.

WRT to ash trees we know in advance that we are unlikely to be able to stop this fungus. The sheer weigh of spores wafting over from Europe make it a losing battle before we begin.

[Little John]

You don't have to wait to be taxed Biff, you can just write a cheque and send it to the Forestry Commission.

Or is it other people's money you are rushing to spend again?

Do you have a problem with central taxation in principle or merely central taxation for things you don't like?

I'm not being deliberately provocative here JSD. I'm genuinely wishing to know the answer to the above question

Why are you limiting the question to just two possible outcomes? I might be very left wing and be in favour of increased central taxation for everybody else besides me.

As it happens like most people I dislike all taxation.

Some taxation is essential to maintain the infrastructure and resources of our society but I would dearly like the spending decisions for those essentials removed from the pocket of the politicians.

Increased taxation gives Governments far too much money to spend and with that comes too much power to influence the electorate and buy their way in to long terms of office.

Taxation should be minimal and Government coffers not viewed as some bottomless pit.

WRT to ash trees we know in advance that we are unlikely to be able to stop this fungus. The sheer weigh of spores wafting over from Europe make it a losing battle before we begin.

So, the answer to my question is that you don't like taxation for things you don't like. Ok, fair enough. Why didn't you just say so at the beginning?

[biffvernon]

WRT to ash trees we know in advance that we are unlikely to be able to stop this fungus. The sheer weigh of spores wafting over from Europe make it a losing battle before we begin.

As with many aspects of the environmental threats we face, it may well be too late and we may all be doomed, along with the ash trees. However, 40 years ago, when I started campaigning on environmental issues, we had a choice. We could have spent a significantly greater proportion of our GDP on science research and we could have adopted similar biosecurity measures to those in place in Australasia and the South Pacific.

We are now at the stage where we must mitigate the environmental damages. To that end, I would cancel Trident today instead of announcing it's continued funding, and divert the money spent to university biology departments. This is a policy that could be enacted by coffee time this morning. By tea time we could arrange for the rest of defence spending to be similarly diverted and by Tuesday we could have a 90% tax on all wages over the 'living wage' of £7.20 per hour. I hear this morning that Barclays are considering reducing the wages of their employees who earn between £500000 and £3000000 so we're going in the right direction.