This lethal fungus is wreaking havoc on pine trees in the Magic Valley

All around the Magic Valley you can find spruce and pine trees standing dead in twos, threes and fours. The culprit: needle rust, and this fungus spreads easily to neighboring evergreens.

• Once a tree is infected, it quickly turns all the needles brown before dropping them, seemingly overnight.
• This year the College of Southern Idaho has removed 20 spruce and pine trees, in hopes of stopping the spread of the fungus to neighboring healthy trees.
• Infected trees can be sprayed, but most likely the tree has to be removed to prevent infecting others.

( Below is the transcript from the broadcast story)

"Usually you can't tell when it's infected until it starts turning brown,” Ryan Musgrave told me.

Musgrave is a certified Arborist, and has been in tree care industry for about 15 years.

“You don't see it in time, and by that time it's kind of too late.”

I caught up with Musgrave as he and the crew from Elevations Tree Service were removing this massive elm tree near Murtaugh.

While they remove all kinds of trees, He says he’s seen a big uptick in sick or dying evergreens like spruce, pine, and fir trees across the Magic Valley.

“So there's a few issues going on,” Musgrave said. “The main one being the needle cast. It's a fungus that spreads from tree to tree. That's the main thing. I'm seeing. The needles starts turning brown starts purple-brown, and start falling off and it kills the tree.”

College of Southern Idaho this year has had 20 spruce and pine trees removed, after they quickly turned brown and died.

This crew from 4 Seasons Tree Service has been busy, removing trees from Gooding, Jerome, and Twin Falls, as well as other parts of the Magic Valley.

There’s no guarantee that every tree will get killed by the needle cast, but once one tree catches it, the others nearby are bound to catch it, too.

“Talk to your local spray company,” Musgrave said. “If you can catch it early enough can be treated usually takes couple years of spraying, but it can be treated.

“But most likely, if you don’t catch it in time and it spreads through the tree, the tree’s done.”