North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["Dr. Lucky Pittman" <lucky.pittman@murraystate.edu>]

Kathy Jo,
The 'experts' have proclaimed for decades that wound dressings are
ineffectual at best, and may be counter-productive in many instances.  One
fellow over at the GardenWeb Trees forum is a big proponent of copper-based
anti-fungal products - don't know if he's talking about copper naphthenate
or what - to diminish or delay colonization of exposed wood by
wood-degrading fungi.  Personally, I'm a student of the school of benign
neglect.
I've not tried bridge-grafting, but it shouldn't be too difficult to do.
Depending upon how wide the girdle is, you may need some pretty lengthy
water-sprout type shoots to bridge the gap.

Lucky