[MAIPC] spotted lanternfly thoughts

[Richard Gardner]

  I live literally on the front line of thepanic/war on the Spotted Lanternfly near Shartlesville in Berks County, PA. Weuse I-78, the apparent northern border of the spread, as a local commutingroute. Blue Mountain and the Appalachian Trail are a few minutes north of us.There is at least one large fruit orchard nearby. We buy vegetables from alocal organic grower.

  This summer Iwill be spending a lot of time along the Appalachian Trail and other trails inBerks County, PA. My goals are twofold. The first is to continue researchon Castanea dentata and its natural comeback from the blightwhile taking down the severely misguided American Chestnut Foundation. Thesecond will be observation of the spotted lanternfly to learn as much as I canas fast as I can. To this end I will be especially looking at Celastrusorbiculatus, various Lonicera sp., Rosa multiflora,other woody non-natives from Asia and naturally Ailanthus altissimato see if the spotted lanternfly feeds on these plants from its point oforigin.

  It would be avaluable research project if someone were to collect these plants along withnative equivalents and test them directly with the spotted lanternfly to learnwhich ones are potential food sources. For now, the local agriculture peopleare focusing on Ailanthus. However, if the Asian plants serve aspreferential food sources over native plants we will have an overwhelmingbreeding area because in Berks County the understory is almost all non-nativein large areas of disturbed forest.

   A big concern ofmine with the panic locally is that scared people act stupidly and scaredstupid people act very stupidly. (Then there are the illiterate politicians wehave to deal with in Berks County and Pennsylvania who are feeding the panic.) Myexpectation is that many farmers will be loading up their fruit and vegetablecrops with more pesticides than they already are. This makes me hesitant to buylocal produce unless it is labelled "organic". It will also add morepoisons to our streams, land, ground water and the air we breathe. We arealready inundated with agricultural poisons - how much more can we and theecosystems take? Many of the local ecosystems are already in a catastrophicstate - I fear the additional damage.

  My understanding of how Ailanthus is killed by the PA Game Commission is that they spraythe trees with glyphosate and/or triclopyr. If this is still the practice andis generalized with the PA Ag department, then the collateral damage will behuge as spray drift is hard to control and perfect windless conditions arealmost non-existent. I understand that to use other methods is impractical withthe number of Ailanthus trees inBerks and Schuylkill counties, especially with clonal stands. However, theremust be a better method or at least more benign chemicals which do the same.

  It appears thatthe PA Ag folks are falling into the Japanese beetle trap syndrome by settingup trap trees around fields of vulnerable crops. The result will be instead ofkeeping the spotted lanternfly away from the crops, it will be bringing theminto the fields instead. I have heard that the best place for a Japanese beetletrap is your neighbor's yard as it will attract them there instead of to youryard. This is good advice for keeping the spotted lanternfly off crops.

  Our organic garden was severely damaged bythe Brown Marmorated Stinkbug last summer. The tomatoes which survived thelocalized tomato blight were full of bites from the BMSB. We lost about 90% ofour late season pole beans to the BMSB. Peppers were untouched as were othervegetables. If the spotted lanternfly has similar feeding habits to the BMSBour garden will be an unfortunately great place to observe how these twoinsects interact.

  Finally, if thehatching of the spotted lanternfly eggs is in sync with the leafing outof Ailanthus, it is a strong indicator that Ailanthus isa requirement for successful development and reproduction. Near home in the lowerelevations, the non-native understory is in leaf. Ailanthus appearsto still be in dormancy, even though the temperatures this weekend may changethat. 

  These are just mythoughts and concerns.

 

                                      Richard Gardner

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