CUMBERLAND — The movement of ash trees and ash wood out of Western Maryland has been quarantined by the Maryland Department of Agriculture since July in an effort to prevent the spread of the emerald ash borer, according to information on the agency’s website.
“We believe placing a quarantine on Maryland counties west of the Susquehanna River and the Chesapeake Bay is the best way to secure Maryland’s Eastern Shore where the (borer) has not been found and protect our riparian forest buffer plantings,” Secretary Buddy Hance is quoted as saying.
Nathan Bennett, Cumberland, who described himself as a contracted summer worker for the agency, said this past summer he discovered eight sites in eastern Allegany County that contained the borers.
“Green Ridge, Sideling Hill and along Interstate 68 near Flintstone,” Bennett said.
“If you saw a purple borer trap hanging from a tree in Allegany County, I put it up,” Bennett said.
Bennett said ash trees are common in Allegany County, making up one-third of the tree density in some areas.
“The trees die quickly from the borers,” he said. “I saw green ash trees in June that were dead in August.”
Bennett predicts that the public will start to be more aware of the issue when patches of dead ash trees become visible. He said the agency has stopped funding summer investigations for the larvae of the insect, because there is nothing that can be done to stop the borer.
“They will use their funds for other invaders, such as the hemlock woolly adelgid, that they can do something about,” he said.
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State working to stop spread of emerald ash borer
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