The deadly experiment that could save the American elm

To save the American elm—once a symbol of American Main Street—researchers are deliberately killing them. Grist reports that the Nature Conservancy in Vermont has begun infecting roughly fifty-three hundred elm trees with Dutch elm disease, the fungus that wiped out tens of millions of their ancestors over the past century. Most will die. But the survivors—the ones with natural resistance—could be cloned to restore disease-tolerant elms to North America's landscapes. That's important: American elms once dominated floodplains from Canada to Texas. They reduce flooding, which climate change is intensifying, and they support insects and wildlife found nowhere else. If successful, this experiment could create the healthiest, most genetically diverse population of American elms seen in over a hundred years.

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