Minnesota Department Of Agriculture Teaching People How To Find Emerald Ash Borer

TWO HARBORS, Minn. — A type of beetle known as the Emerald Ash Borer was first identified in Two Harbors last spring. The species can be a huge problem as they can kill trees.

Tuesday experts from the Minnesota Department of Agriculture were teaching people outside of Seagren’s Home Hardware how to find trees becoming sick from beetles.

They hope to slow the spread of the insect to other areas of the state that are not impacted yet.

These workshops are held in March because it’s the best time to find EAB while looking for woodpecker damage.

“So, the best thing to look for is, so what you’ll see is some blonding or some areas of the bark where the barks been sluffed off by a woodpecker. And you look for these kind of dime, shallow, wood peck, dime size, oval shaped shallow wood peck holes. Just going to the surface of the wood to get the insect larvae,” explained Jonathan Osthus, Emerald Ash Borer Technical Assistance Coordinator.

Experts say it’s best to deal with trees before they are completely dead, dry out, and become a hazard.

“If you want to save your tree there are insecticide options for individual trees. If you have a nice larger tree in your yard that you don’t want to lose, you can begin doing insecticide treatments. It’s not a once and done thing, but it’s you know depending on the type of treatment you use it’s either you gotta reapply it every year or every other year,” said Osthus.

The Minnesota Department of Agriculture depends on people reporting new areas of Emerald Ash Borer trees. If you’d like to make a report, click the link here.