Key Features
- Dime sized holes in trunk
- Wood shavings, or wet spots on trunk
- Large beetles with long antenna
Symptoms
Damage is caused by the larval stage of the beetle that consumes the heartwood and weakens limbs. Until limbs break, symptoms are hard to see from a distance. Trees need to be inspected up close in order to find symptoms. The larvae, which can reach an inch and half in length, bore underneath the bark and cut off nutrient flow from the tree. Actively infested trees have visible black or brown pits where adults have laid their eggs. Larval feeding beneath the bark can cause areas of the trunk to appear black and weeping with liquid. Adults chew through the bark and emerge from dime sized holes. Adults are distinctly large (1-2 inches long) with a black body, light spots and have long antennae. Look for sawdust-like excrement around large holes to help distinguish from woodpecker holes.
Biology
Adults emerge in the spring and mate after a couple days of feeding on the bark of young twigs and on the tissue around the main veins of leaves. Adults lay eggs in small depressions they make by chewing on the bark. Eggs hatch within two weeks and begin feeding on tree vascular tissue. After a few weeks, the small larvae bore into the heartwood to feed until they reach nearly 1.5 inches in length. There is one generation per year.
Management Recommendations
Currently ALB is a regulated pest. The current policy of the USDA Animal Plant Health Inspection Service is to eradicate this pest. For this reason, it is possible for your tree to be destroyed by this agency even after you have treated your tree. Therefore we do not recommend treatment of your trees at this time. If you find this pest please use the "useful links" button on the homepage of the detailed information about this pest to report your find to local authorities via the beetlebusters homepage (http://beetlebusters.info/) or if you are in Indiana, please use the "Report ALB Here" link or call 1-866-NO-EXOTIC.
Effective Pesticides
Pesticides are neither available nor recommended for managing this pest.
Resources
- Report this pest
- For more information about invasives, visit https://ag.purdue.edu/reportinvasive/
- Pest Tracker Map
- Not satisfied with ID? Contact the Purdue Plant and Pest Diagnostic Lab
- Sign Up for the Purdue Landscape Report
