By KEVIN WALKER
Michigan Correspondent

LANSING, Mich. — The Michigan Department of Agriculture has made several announcements recently regarding new finds of emerald ash borer (EAB) in the state’s Upper Peninsula (UP).

Two weeks ago, state officials announced the latest detection of EAB in Schoolcraft County, in the mid-section of the UP. Early in October the state announced that federal officials had discovered the beetle, a native of Asia, in Delta County, right on the border with Schoolcraft County.

A month before that, in early September, state officials announced it was detected in Houghton County. As a result, quarantines were put into place for Houghton and Keweenaw counties. Keweenaw was put under a less restrictive quarantine because it’s landlocked by Houghton County. The beetle hasn’t been detected there yet, however.

“Based on the initial investigation of the Delta and Schoolcraft finds, we know that it’s been there a while,” said Jim Bowes, the EAB eradication program manager. “What we are finding there is dead trees. When the population (of EAB) builds, you end up seeing dead and dying ash.”

Bowes said EAB has probably been in Schoolcraft and Delta counties for several years. The most recent finds underscore the fact that EAB is difficult, if not impossible, to eradicate from any given area. State and federal officials have given up on the idea of ever getting rid of the pest, Bowes said. Instead, they hope to contain it as much as possible.

This is done through the quarantine program the state has put into place and by working with lumber companies, private foresters and local officials. There are experiments being conducted to test the effectiveness of parasitical wasps in minimizing the spread of EAB. There is also research underway to find out if organisms or plants native to Asia might help to slow the beetle’s spread.

The beetle is spreading much faster than it would naturally because of the illegal movement of firewood, according to Bowes. People would like to transport their firewood and believe that it isn’t infested with ash borer. Sometimes, however, they are mistaken.
Houghton County is on the far west side of the UP, while Chippewa County, where the beetle was detected in the UP several years ago, is on the eastern side.

EAB has also been detected in Mackinac County in the UP.
“We’re going to see a lot more EAB in the state and the whole country,” Bowes said. “We’re trying to put some tools in the toolbox to help us manage this pest.”

One bright spot for state officials is Chippewa County, where EAB was discovered early in its development in a state forest, and may have been eradicated. According to Bowes, it hasn’t been detected there for three years. If it isn’t detected for one more year, the county will be taken off the quarantine.

Because of the unusual circumstances under which the beetle was discovered and the area treated, however, it doesn’t provide much of a precedent for other areas. “This would be the first site where eradication efforts were successful,” Bowes said.

EAB was discovered for the first time this year in Wisconsin, Missouri and Virginia. It was previously discovered in seven other states as well as in Ontario, Canada. It was first detected in southeastern lower Michigan in 2002. Since then, every county in the Lower Peninsula has been put under an EAB quarantine.