Explain your statement to justify your assertion. I'm sure, with your experience in orchards and as an arborist, you'll come up with something? Give it a try!
You live in the Northeast so you should be familiar with both peach and red oak trees? The former has common insect pests known as borers, the latter is currently under attack by a fungus found as close as New York state
I'll give You 2 examples where wound/pruning dressing is an effective means to prevent, insects (1) and diseases (2). Want some more examples?
1) Lesser Peach Tree Borer-
Lesser peachtree borer overwinters as larvae underneath the bark. Larvae of all stages except the first may be found during the winter. The larvae feed for a period in the spring before burrowing just below the surface of the bark to pupate. Borers remain in the pupal stage from 18 to 30 days before emerging as adults.
Female moths deposit eggs in small clusters in cracks and crevices near wounds between ground level and eight feet high. Females lay an average of 400 small oval, reddish brown eggs. Larvae begin to hatch in 8 to 10 days and burrow into the bark,
often entering through cracks caused by other factors such as winter injury, pruning scars or machinery wounds. Moths emerge from early May until late September in Kentucky, USA. There are two generations per year with adult emergence in May and June, then again in August and September.
https://entomology.ca.uky.edu/ef213
2) Oak Wilt Fungus-
Overland Spread of Oak Wilt
New infection centers can occur if the fungus is carried from an infected tree to a fresh wound on a healthy tree by an insect in a process called overland spread (figure 3, upper pathway).
View attachment 568176
Oak wilt spore mats emit a strong, fruity or wine-like odor that attracts many different species of nitidulid beetles (figure 6), also known as sap beetles. As they feed on or tunnel through the spore mats, nitidulid beetles often accumulate fungal spores on the surface of their bodies.
View attachment 568171
Oak trees often sustain wounds caused by construction equipment, storms, pruning tools, or vandalism. Fresh wounds usually leak sap that attracts insects, including nitidulid beetles that have visited oak wilt spore mats. The overland movement of the fungus via nitidulid beetles that visit both spore mats on infected trees and
wounds on otherwise healthy trees thus creates most new infection centers.
Avoid wounding oaks during critical infection periods.
- If pruning is necessary, or if wounds occur on oak trees during the critical infection period, apply tree wound dressings or paints as soon as possible to prevent transmission of oak wilt.
oakwiltusda.pdf
