EMERALD ASH BORER DISTRIBUTION EXPANDING IN CONNECTICUT: CAES Press Release

The Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station

123 HUNTINGTON STREET, P.O. BOX 1106, NEW HAVEN, CONNECTICUT 06504
Putting Science to Work for Society
Protecting Agriculture, Public Health, and the Environment
Founded 1875
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PRESS RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Wednesday, July 16, 2014

MEDIA CONTACTS:
Dr. Kirby C. Stafford III, Ph.D Dr. Claire Rutledge, Ph.D.
Chief Scientist/State Entomologist Assistant Scientist II
The Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station The Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station
123 Huntington Street 123 Huntington Street
P.O. Box 1106 P.O. Box 1106
New Haven, CT 06504 New Haven, CT 06504
Phone: (203) 974-8485 Phone: (203) 974-8484

EMERALD ASH BORER DISTRIBUTION EXPANDING IN CONNECTICUT

New Haven, CT - The Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station (CAES) announced today that the
emerald ash borer (Agrilus planipennis) (EAB) infestation, largely centered in New Haven County, has
rapidly expanded into Fairfield, Hartford, Litchfield, and Middlesex Counties and has now been detected
in a total of 38 towns. The new towns where the beetle has been detected this year include: Ansonia,
Branford, Bristol, Clinton, Cromwell, Derby, Durham, Litchfield, Meriden, New Haven, North Haven,
Orange, Plainville, Rocky Hill, Seymour, Shelton, Thomaston, Trumbull, Wallingford, West Haven,
Wolcott, Woodbridge, Woodbury. The insects were previously found in Beacon Falls, Bethany, Cheshire,
Hamden, Middlebury, Naugatuck, Newtown, North Branford, Oxford, Prospect, Sherman, Southbury,
Southington, and Waterbury in 2012 or 2013. Additional detections are anticipated.

The emerald ash borer is a destructive insect and has been responsible for the death and decline of tens of
millions of ash trees from Colorado and the mid-west to New England and south to Georgia. Ash makes
up about 4% to 15% of Connecticut’s forests and represents about 2-3% of the urban trees in many
communities.

“Unfortunately, we are now seeing a lot of dead and dying ash in New Haven County and more ash trees
will die as a result of this expanding infestation” said State Entomologist Kirby C. Stafford III. When
EAB is found, municipalities and homeowners can assess their ash trees and plan for the impact of this
beetle. High value trees and lightly infested trees can be treated with systemic insecticides to protect them
against the emerald ash borer. Untreated ash trees will be lost and can die within 2-3 years once infested.
Ash trees quickly decline and become hazardous, requiring removal, depending upon their location and
risk to people and property.

“The spread of EAB within our state poses a severe and imminent threat to ash trees on both private and
public property,” said Department of Energy and Environmental Protection Commissioner Rob Klee. “It
is critical for property owners to assess the condition of their ash trees and make decisions to treat trees
with appropriate chemicals to try to save them or to remove trees that pose safety risks. We also strongly
encourage property owners to utilize only licensed and insured professionals to either treat or remove their ash trees.”

Many EAB detections have been made by monitoring the ground-nesting, native wasp (Cerceris fumipennis), which hunts many wood-boring beetles, including the emerald ash borer. The wasp is an effective “biological surveillance” survey tool and does not sting people or pets according to Dr. Claire E. Rutledge, who runs the CAES survey program. In addition, purple detection traps have been set across Middlesex, Tolland, Windham, and New London counties by Thomas Worthley, University of Connecticut Cooperative Extension System. The surveillance programs are supported by the USDA-APHIS-PPQ.

In Connecticut, quarantine had previously been established that regulates the movement of ash logs, ash materials, ash nursery stock, and hardwood firewood from within Fairfield, Hartford, Litchfield and New Haven Counties to any area outside of those counties to help slow the spread of the beetle. The quarantine currently applies to only those four counties and mirrors a federal quarantine also imposed on the four counties.

With the detection of EAB in Middlesex County and rapid expansion of the EAB infestation to five of the state’s eight counties, CAES plans to remove the state internal quarantine by adding Middlesex, New London, Tolland, and Windham counties to the existing EAB quarantine. Until that time, the current state and federal EAB quarantine is still in effect. A public hearing will be held in August at the CAES Griswold Research Center, 190 Sheldon Road, Griswold, CT 06351, on a date still to be determined.

Regulations also are in effect regulating the movement of firewood from out-of-state into Connecticut or within Connecticut. These regulations were put in place to ensure that other invasive insects, not just the emerald ash borer, are not carried into Connecticut through the shipment of firewood. These regulations are not influenced by the new EAB detections.

Detailed information about the current quarantine and the firewood regulations can be found at www.ct.gov/deep/eab or www.ct.gov/caes.

The emerald ash borer is a regulated plant pest under federal (7 CFR 301.53) and state (CT Gen. Statute Sec. 22-84-5d, e, and f) regulations. For more information about the EAB, please visit the following website: www.emeraldashborer.info. A fact sheet providing guidelines on the treatment of ash trees to protect them from EAB is also available at www.ct.gov/caes.

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Phone: (203) 974-8500 Fax: (203) 974-8502
Toll Free: 1-(877) 855-2237
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Nasty bug invades Litchfield Republican American

A native Buprestid beetle captured by a Cerceris Wasp and sent to CT Ag. Exp. Station for identification.

Nasty bug invades Litchfield Republican American



We detected Emerald Ash Borer for the first time in Litchfield while utilizing Cerceris Wasp as a bio-surveillance tool.  John McKenna reported on the problem in the Sunday's (July 13, 2014) Waterbury Republican American newspaper.

Waterfowl Boxes

So we had some maintenance that we needed to catch up on. This maintenance isn't too simple in terms of actually getting to the location and it requires us to take the truck out on to the trails. And once you actually get to the spot you either have to go by canoe or be ready to throw on a pair of waders.

One of our waterfowl nest boxes located on Heron Pond
We have waterfowl nest boxes installed around the property. These boxes are important to ducks who use them to make their nests. The most common ducks to visit the boxes are Wood Ducks and Hooded Mergansers. Occasionally, Great Crested Flycatchers can be found as well. 
The problem is, these ducks aren't the only creatures out there interested in said boxes. Predators like raccoon's often attempt to climb up these nestboxes in order find food at the expense of the ducklings. This is when predator guards come in handy. They are meant to act as a non-climbable surface and consist of a PVC pipe that is attached to the nestbox. This would be the same kind of predator guard that we use on our bluebird boxes. The screws holding the predator guards to the boxes can end up rusting, leaving the PVC pipe to drop into the murky water below. We simply have to get to the box, fish out the PVC, and screw them back in. If the PVC is screwed back in and there doesn't seem to be any other problems, the box will be ready for the next season.

Ash Borer Traps 2014

Here's some information on another project of ours. I am personally all too familiar with this project, seeing as how much we focused on it last summer. So, has anyone seen our purple traps lately? I'll tell you straight away that they haven't moved much since last year. Now, while the state is no longer keeping tabs on their hanging traps in western Connecticut, we're still checking ours on a regular basis.
We're checking the traps for an invasive beetle called the Emerald Ash Borer. It has already been found most recently in the towns of Southington and Watertown, so we're on alert here in Litchfield.

Ash Borer trap at the Wamogo high school
The beetles are attracted to both the color of the trap and the scent pack located on the other side of the panels.The scent pack contains chemicals that are associated with ash leaves. At each trap we must first take it down and then check the purple panels for Emerald Ash Borers. The beetles get stuck on the sticky residue coated on the panels and can't really go anywhere. We go to each side of the trap and meticulously scan over the insects to see if any are Eastern Ash Borers present. If there are any insects that look suspicious, we take them off of the trap and preserve them in ethyl alcohol until we can make a proper identification. 

We have checked all of the traps on our property and thankfully we have yet to find any ash borers. The most common insects we find are usually fireflies. We will continue to check these traps until evidence of ash borers in Litchfield is found. 

On the Hunt for Invasives

We've been focusing on our projects lately including the emerald ash borer traps, the snake/amphibian coverboards, and the bluebird boxes. We usually put these projects on the top of our priority list and try to get them done while the weather is good. If we get those projects done early, we usually get back out to the field to look for certain plants. Plants that shouldn't be here.
Garlic Mustard (Alliaria petiolata) along the Lake trail

Invasive plants are everywhere. Connecticut has no shortage of them. When exploring the White Memorial trails, it would take someone less than 3 minutes to find a plant species that shouldn't be there. Invasive plants are damaging to ecosystems because they can crowd out the native species and have the potential to change the ecosystem.That's why we're interested in their presence. We search in areas that are likely to contain the invasives and look for good-looking specimens to take with us.

Narrowleaf Bittercrest (Cardamine impatiens) at the western entrance of the boardwalk

The eventual destination of these specimens are the University of Connecticut Biological Collections. Here, they can be cataloged and used for research purposes if needed. After we collect them in the field, the specimens are pressed between sheets of newspaper under high pressure. This is done for preservation and storage purposes.We like to get at least 3 specimens to press when doing this. Having this many specimens allows us to have options when choosing which plant we want to send out. When looking at a plant, we look to see if all aspects of the plant are well represented. This includes the roots, stem, leaves, and flowers/fruit. If it all checks out, we can cross that invasive off our list and go to the next one.
Sheep Sorrel (Rumex acetosella) at the sewer beds

Bluebird Business as Usual

It's a project that I'm all too familiar with. It was one of the first projects I got to help with when I first interned here last summer. And in terms of what to expect every time, this project falls into 1st place for being the most variable.

If you've been around the museum or Ongley Pond, you've most likely seen some of our bluebird boxes. The boxes are set up in a way to be both easily accessible to people and inaccessible to predators. These boxes are checked periodically at 2-3 week intervals. The interns and I go out to the boxes with a cordless drill and proceed to open them up one at a time. Our task is to then check the nest and write down all relevant data. This data includes bird species type, number of eggs/young, young status, and nest status.
White Memorial has been taking part in this statewide program since the 1990's. Coordinated by the Connecticut DEEP, the objective of the program is to restore the Bluebird populations that have been in decline for over 40 years. Species like the Bluebird and Tree Swallow are cavity-nesting songbirds that require preexisting cavities in their habitat in order to nest. By providing said habitats, we are able to give the birds safe areas to raise their young and thus help to bring their population back up. Besides this, we are able to use the nest box data for other purposes. For example, we can use the data to keep track of these bird populations throughout the season. We can see where each species type is hanging out and who's using which boxes. We can also get an idea of how many nestlings are surviving to adulthood.
House Wren nestlings in one of our boxes

Thankfully this project is one that interns can easily pick up on. It does take time to go to each box and record all relevant data. Though it isn't a particularly grueling task, the job isn't always a walk in the park. An outsider watching us work would probably find a couple reasons to laugh at us. The birds (especially Tree Swallows) are quite territorial around their young, meaning that they don't appreciate it when we come out to visit them. This means that we end up getting dive-bombed by birds on a regular basis. Don't worry. We get used to it.