The Town of Okotoks is telling residents to check the leaves of their trees this fall for Bronze Leaf Disease.

Bronze leaf disease is a fungus that attacks Swedish columnar aspen, tower poplar and some cases in the trembling aspen tree. The disease moves through the veins of the leaves entering trees resulting in branch die back and the possible death of the tree.

Town of Okotoks Urban Forester Gordon White says you'll be able to tell if your trees have the disease.

"The symptoms start to up about this time of year," he says. "The leaves start to turn kind of a bronze-brown colour but leaf veins tend to stay green and then the leaves that are infected tend to persist over the winter."

 White says pruning the trees is the best way to combat the disease.

"Prune it out when you see signs of the infection, so you want to inspect the trees annually about this time and prune out any sort of visible signs of infection and then dispose of the branches by burying it in our landfill or burning it."

White also mentions that diversifying the type of trees you begin to plant could make a difference from getting bronze leaf disease to not having it.

"It's quite commonly people line the whole edges or perimeter (of their homes) with these columnar species," he says. "The other thing I'd recommend is if people are looking for aspen to just plant the native trembling aspen, structurally it's an easier tree to maintain and shows resistance to bronze leaf disease."

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