Bug that kills ash trees found in Illinois

June 13, 2006

BY JIM PAUL ASSOCIATED PRESS

A pest blamed for killing millions of ash trees in Michigan, Indiana

and Ohio has reached Illinois, prompting state officials to prepare a

detection and eradication plan they hope to begin within the next few

weeks, the state agriculture department said Tuesday.

The emerald ash borer was found recently by a homeowner in a rural

subdivision near Lily Lake, about 40 miles west of Chicago in central

Kane County, said Warren Goetsch, division manager for natural

resources in the agriculture department. But it's possible the pest has

been in trees there as long as five years.

"I think if it gets established, it will absolutely eliminate all of

our ash trees," James A. Appleby, a University of Illinois professor

and scientist with the Illinois Natural History Survey in Champaign,

said Tuesday. "So far, there are no ash trees that have been found

resistant."

Emerald ash borer is blamed for the loss of 12 million to 15 million

trees in Michigan, Indiana and Ohio since it was first found near

Detroit in 2002. The pest is believed to have found its way to the

United States in shipping crates, possibly as long as 15 years ago,

Appleby said.

Agriculture department officials believe the borer reached Illinois in

firewood that was brought from an infested area, Goetsch said before a

news conference in Geneva.

The pest feeds only on ash trees. The dark green larvae feed on the

wood under the bark, killing the nutrition-conducting cells of the tree

and leaving serpentine tunnels, he said.

After metamorphosis, the adult beetle, which is about half an inch

long, chews its way out through the tree, leaving behind a hole about

one-eighth inch across that is shaped like a capital D.

State officials plan to conduct a survey in the next few weeks to try

to determine whether the bug has spread beyond the subdivision where it

was found and to declare it a nuisance, which would allow the state to

destroy infested ash trees, Goetsch said.

"Once we have the delimiting survey done, we'll be scheduling a hearing

to establish a quarantine, which would allow us to restrict the

movement of infested tree material," he said. "The one thing we don't

want to do is facilitate the artificial movement of this."

The survey and hearing are expected to be finished by mid-July, Goetsch

said.

not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.