Have you noticed how beautiful the dogwoods are this year? Have you looked at them closely?

It is my observation, while driving past, that there are varying levels of dead twigs and branches in at least half the trees I see. Older trees generally show more problems than the younger ones.

The culprit is anthracnose with a liberal dose of mildew thrown in. This disease combination, especially the anthracnose, has literally destroyed the native population of dogwoods across the states south of us.

Perhaps our colder winters will halt the march of the problem north, but while we cheered last winter the dogwoods looked on in dismay. Dogwoods are generally under story trees, meaning that they grow naturally in the shade of other trees.

This cooler, damper location adds to the problem, although I am seeing problems in the middle of sunny yards.

If you see dead branches in your dogwood, remove them immediately. The general rule of thumb for removal of diseased branches is to cut a foot behind the infected area. Also, sterilize your cutting tools frequently to prevent spread of the disease as you work. Dipping them in a mixture of bleach and water is adequate.

A number of years ago the landscape industry began planting Kousa dogwoods as one answer to the problem. Unfortunately, this introduction from Asia has an entirely different growth habit and flowering time.

Research at the University of Tennessee has focused on finding individual trees that showed resistance and building a breeding program around them. This has resulted in a number of named cultivars that show significantly better resistance than our native population.

Another program at Rutgers University has, over the last 20 or 25 years, concentrated on cross breeding to introduce just enough of the Kousa dogwood into the native varieties to achieve the desired resistance.

The Tennessee program offers a full range of colors but less resistance than the New Jersey program. If you want the pinks and the reds, select a named cultivar of Cornus florida. You might spot a Cherokee series in the marketplace. There are others.

The Stellar series is the name given to the Rutgers introductions. You may find names like Constellation, Celestial, Venus or even Stellar Pink. The latter is a trifle misleading. It has a hint of pink but is rather white.

These new hybrids are free of the disease problems. Thus, you can expect a larger, faster growing tree with larger flowers.

After a working lifetime of research, the Stellar series is about to become available. I suspect additional releases will be made over the next few years.

If you are planting a dogwood, I would think seriously before planting the straight native species, Cornus florida. Look for a cultivar with some resistance or consider the new hybrids.