Saturday, April 30, 2011

EMERALD ASH BORER

50 to 100 million trees have died in North America since the mid 90's due to the invasive Emerald Ash Borer according to today's Woolwich Observer (Pg. 35). The title is "Feds taking new steps to contain the spread of Emerald Ash Borer". Apparently one of the reasons that Woolwich Township have as yet not shown signs of infestation is due to very few ash trees because of the importance of maple syrup production and hence maple trees. Apparently the pest came hidden in packing crates from Asia according to this article although I'm sure that I've read earlier on, that Asia means China. Their economic explosion has included steel cast parts for industrial use which have been shipped via wooden packing crates to Canada and the U.S.. The good news is that there is a tremendous amount of research underway trying to halt this insect in it's tracks.
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2 comments:

  1. KatieMay 6, 2011 at 3:57 PM

    The bad news is that EAB is a really tough little insect--we were hoping that it would be too cold for it to move too far north in Ontario and it turns out these guys can survive down to at least -30. I can tell you that London is losing a lot of trees to it, and it's been found in Toronto..so I would bet that it's in KW.

    If anyone's interested, this page lists some of the publications my lab has put out on EAB this past year: http://publish.uwo.ca/~bsincla7/pubs.html

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  2. AlanMay 6, 2011 at 6:56 PM

    Thanks Katie!

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