Hi Kathleen,

Debris from dogwoods infected with golden canker should be burned or buried. It sounds like it should not be put in yard waste.

If your city collects yard waste check with them to see what they recommend (I already emailed Minneapolis to see what they say). It looks like you live in Hennepin County. Since our waste goes to the garbage burner downtown, another possibility for safe disposal is to cut up and bag the tree and put it in the garbage.

If I hear from Minneapolis about this issue I’ll let you know. If you live in another city, check with them.

I hope this helps.

You’re welcome. If I get a reply to my email, I’ll add it.

Hi again Kathleen,

The city finally replied and this is what they said:

“Hello Mary Jane,

I checked in with both the DNR and MDA on this. Here’s the response I got from DNR:

“In my experience, golden canker on pagoda dogwood is quite common (and just confirmed this in the literature). Therefore, I don’t think there’s any ecological threat by moving it to community yard waste sites. Furthermore, it seems to be an opportunistic pathogen, and maybe even a latent pathogen, implying (to me at least) that moving infested material poses to economic threat either.”

I also cc’d our composter, SET, on the email and they confirmed they would accept this material. So, the dogwood brush (so long as it’s less than 3” in diameter) and less then 3’ long, can be bundled for yard waste pickup or put into paper Kraft bags for yard waste pickup in Minneapolis. Here’s our Yard Waste web page for information on set-out requirements: https://www.minneapolismn.gov/resident-services/garbage-recycling-cleanup/yard-waste/

If the pieces are bigger than 3” in diameter, they’ll have to be brought to a yard waste drop-off site:https://www.hennepin.us/residents/recycling-hazardous-waste/yard-tree-waste-disposal”

I don’t know if this helps you now Kathleen, but that’s what they said.