Honey fungus on Leylandi..?

[Loofah]

Hi, I have a leylandi hedge at the rear of my garden which appears to have got honey fungus growing from the base of one of the trees. It seems to be growing well and appears healthy but I'm a bit concerned that it will turn brown and die before my eyes!
I saw an article that said that the authors 'magic solution' for this was to mix burnt garden waste ash with a very small amount of charcoal ash. This sounds daft to me but I'm willing to give it a go if it saves the trees which are well established. I always thought that honey fungus was all but incurable save for removing the tree / plant and surrounding earth.

Any thoughts?

 

[bludger]

Hello,

First are you sure it's honey fungus? There are other brown fungi that can look like it. All honey fungus has a collar under the cap - no collar, it ain't h.f. This isn't to say that it is a harmless fungus, mind you.

There's no proven way to eliminate h.f. Perhaps the best I've read about is a guy who got some diseased mushroom compost from a mushroom farm and dug in large quantities all round his affected area. He said it worked and thought that the disease in the mushrooms also attacked the honey fungus.

The Forestry Commission has produced a booklet on h.f. It seems there are about five different varieties of it, Armillaria mellea and A. ostoyae being the most destructive. They can attack a wide range of plants.

Good luck

 

[ModernMaterials]

I saw an article that said that the authors 'magic solution' for this was to mix burnt garden waste ash with a very small amount of charcoal ash.

the best way to create the ash is to use a flamethrower on the said hedge, having piled all the rubbish up against it

 

[Loofah]

It looks like we read the same article! Well, I dug out as much as I could then dumped some of that 'magic solution' ash on top and am hoping for the best... Since it seems the death of the leylandi could be anything from a couple of weeks to somewhat longer, I'll have to wait and see what happens....
I read a tonne of material from the RHS website and it certainly looked like hf, but I'm no expert. To be honest I just hope the tree lives and I was wrong all along

 

[JohnD]

I have (had?) honey fungus in my garden, it has killed several trees, but doesn't seem to have attacked the neighbour's leylandii just over the fence. I'm pretty sure their roots must extend into the infected area so I think they are immune. Once trees have been badly infected they die quite fast.

I used to get the light brown toadstools in the lawn along the lines of the dead tree roots, but didn't see any this year.

I am growing a couple of vines in the infected area and so far they haven't been infected either.