May 12 2009
What Are We Going to Do About the Emerald Ash Borer?
The Emerald Ash Borer is a foreign predator to a variety of trees here in North America. It was imported to the United States in the recent past (rumored to have come here in infested packaging from Asia) and has become a destroyer of one of the nation’s finest natural resources-our Ash trees. There are billions of trees at stake. This beautiful metallic-green bug has no natural enemies here in North America and is breeding at an alarming rate. Soon, there not be a single state that has not been infected by this flying, tree-killing menace.
What are we going to do about this problem? So far it seems as though our nation has given up the fight and has resigned to fact that all of the stock of Ash trees in our National Forests is doomed. The campaign that is prevalent amongst Ash Borer projects is one against the transportation of firewood. That is what we are currently doing to deal with a problem that should be taken on as a war on our own soil.
Even the searches that I have done to find out about the bug at our government’s websites haven’t been much more productive than what I can find out by reading the flyer at the local gas station. I could leave the links here to pictures and information, but I would like my readers to try to find out more about this problem. What are we going to do about this problem? Is there more on the table than a bunch of signs posted at localities to warn people not to move wood? I would like to know all that I can about this topic.
I do know that the invader has infected the following states per information from the Forestry Service :
Michigan-2002
Maryland-2003
Ohio-2003
Virginia-2003…The pests were eradicated. The EAB was reconfirmed to have infested the forests of Virginia in 2008.
Indiana-2004
Illinois-2006
Pennsylvania-2007
West Virginia-2007
Missouri-2008
Wisconsin-2008
That is ten states in six years! This nuisance has also infected parts of Canada. At this rate, we will be seeing this pest completely infecting the U.S. soon. Maybe as soon as ten or fifteen years. That is my personal opinion, of course, but how could I be wrong as fast as these things are spreading? Simply stopping the transport of firewood will no longer be an option if our nation is to save this tree population. There is a seed collection program, but I believe that is a cop-out. We are far more capable as a nation of great minds than that.
