The Pine Tree Project

@GWilky: yep the Thuthumi valley has a significant number of pines, way more than 15. See some pics in the "Alien invasion" thread mentioned at the top. This might be the venue for the next VE Berg trip.

The worst cases that I have seen so far in the UDP are Wonder Valley and Hlatikhulu in the Monks Cowl area. What will hopefully happen there is that EKZNW will get assistance from Working for Water to tackle the bulk. We will then be called on to tackle the remaining, isolated trees which are difficult to access (like on steep slopes or cliff edges), which may involve some ropework.

Three weeks ago I had an opportunity to see some of the pines in the Mhwlazini Valley on the way to Keith Bush Camp again. These we had tackled on the VE Berg trip in March 2011. We ring-barked the ones that are visible from the trail because they were too big to cut down. Many smaller trees were cut down but these are only apparent when you are right by them. Ring-barking pines is effective but it takes times. We tried as much as possible to ring-bark about a meter of bark and leave as much of the base of the tree exposed to the sun as possible. See the comparison picture below to see the progress. The shots are taken near junction M1 where you leave the contour and head up towards KBC. The ring-barking is evident as the bright yellow sections at the base of the trees. The smaller tree on the extreme right shows the most progress and is definitely dying. All of them are looking yellow. Hopefully in another year the progress will be even further.

@ST: things are definitely drier this year.

It may be tempting to think that the pines are subsequently drier too. But, they are evergreens, and in comparison with the other pines I saw on that trip, for example the three left at KBC, these definitely are looking pale and unwell. Still, I wish there was some way to speed up the process, short of cutting down or poisoning. Input welcome.

An interesting comparison, some pines were ring-barked a while back around the Champagne Castle Hotel, and close to the KZN Wildlife offices. These show very little progress. This could be attributed to insufficient ring-barking (only 20-30cm as opposed to 1m+), as well as dense shade (protection from drying out in the sun) and close proximity to lots of water.

We're not allowed to use poison because it will find its way into the water eventually and this is a big consideration within the park. I've heard water contamination is becoming a general problem for Working For Water too. Poison is needed for wattle, which we currently do not have permission to do. We can tackle pines because they are easy to identify and can be killed mechanically. Thankfully I'm not aware of wattle problem high up in the remote valleys like the pines are. The wattle that I've seen is in the lower, easily accessible areas where a more formal task team can tackle them.

Were there signs of ringbarking? We've come across a couple of dead pines too...no explanation of how they died..possibly lightning or some disease.

Not responsible for this one