Heart-rot disease causes extensive damage to standing forestry crops and perhaps they are the single most disease responsible for loss to forests. Decay usually does not set in till the heart wood is formed in a tree and this takes about 15 to 30 years depending on the species and locality factors. Normally the outer living sapwood and bark afford enough protection to the inner heart wood from attack by decay causing fungi. But when the latter is exposed through openings in the bark and sapwood, the process of decay is initiated in the form of heart-rot which spreads over time.

     Some of the tree species generally affected by this diseases are Acacias, Albizia, Deodar, Deodar, Eucalypts, Khair, Pinus, Sal, Sissoo Teak, Terminalia, etc

     Some of the fungal organisms causing heart-rot are Ganoderma spp., Polyporus spp., Fomes spp., Hymenochaete spp.,  Trametes spp., Armillaria spp., etc.

a) The first symptom indicative of fungal infection is discoloration; heartwood becomes purple/black, sapwood becomes green/brown. 

b) Some of the other symptoms observed are  presence of sporophores (fungal fruiting bodies), punk knots, swollen boles, swollen knots, broken tops, openings and scars in the bole, basal and trunk scars, fire wounds, excessive flow of resin, crown dying, forking of the main stem, cracks and protuberances  in the bark etc.

c) Incipient decay in heartwood is difficult to detect but the wood colour is intermediate between that of sound and decayed wood, i.e. it is usually of darker colour than normal heartwood.

a) Avoid injuries during the weeding, controlled fire or cleaning process.

b) Use of resistant varieties.

C) Early removal of affected plants from the plantation.