Question
My neighbor has a fence row which has young hickory trees growing in it. Several of the trees have galls or cankers on them, mostly on branches in the middle or near the ends of the branches a few have them on the main stem. Some of these trees are 30' high others are only 10' or so. he has healthy older trees in the row as i do on my fence row (different than where the cankers are). His fence row is about 100 yards from mine and i do not find any of these cankers or galls on  my trees. If these galls are infectious I would like to cut the trees down and destroy the source of the infection, I have offered to do this, he said that he would like some more info. He often procrastinates on making decisions and if i had the info. it might help him make a decision and also give me some info. Thanks, Bob

Answer
These sounds like gall wasp type galls and they will not cause the trees any health problems. They will not spread to the other trees and do not need to be removed. The wasps (small insects) have emerged from the galls so there is no threat to adjacent trees. Galls wasps are difficult to control but since they cause little health problems to the tree they are not usually treated.