Emerald Ash Borer: A serious threat to Iowa Ash Trees
What is it?
A
wood-boring beetle that kills North American ash trees.
Metallic
green in color, its slender body measures ½ inch in length and 1/8 inch
wide.
What does it do?
Starves ash trees of
nutrients and water by tunneling under bark.
Has caused the death
and removal of more than 25 million ash trees in Michigan, Ohio,
Indiana, Illinois, Maryland, Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Ontario
since 2002.
What you can do to
prepare?
Don’t transport
firewood! Movement of infected firewood is the leading cause of EAB
expansion.
Volunteer to help your
community to develop a tree inventory.
Protect your trees from
mechanical injuries (lawnmowers, string trimmers, construction projects,
vehicle parking on root zone). Insect borers are attracted to trees that
are stressed or injured.
Water your ash trees
during dry periods.
Talk with city
managers, county governmental officials, state legislators, and US
congressional members. Ask them if they know about EAB and the threat it
poses to Iowa. Now is the time to include EAB preventative efforts in to
fiscal budgets.
Plant a diversity of
tree species
Encourage friends and
relatives to buy and burn local firewood. Moving infested firewood/wood
products is the most likely method for EAB to enter Iowa in the future.
Report
any serious persons trying to sell you a guaranteed protection spray or
injection for your ash tree with the Attorney Generals office. Also
report any person claiming you must remove your ash tree because there
is a ‘bug’ in the area.
Resist the urge to
apply a preventative insecticide treatment at this time. Since EAB is
not known to be in Iowa, let’s wait and direct our efforts to prepare in
other ways.
Know the symptoms of
EAB activity
-Thinning
and dieback of branches
-Water
sprouts on tree trunk or main branches
-
D-shaped exit holes in bark
-Flatten
white larvae feeding under bark of ash trees and producing serpentine
S-shaped tunnels
-Dark
metallic green beetles seen on tree trunks or flying near ash trees.
Adults are small, about as long as Mr. Lincoln’s image on a penny.
