Lake Forest will soon turn from cutting down infested ash trees to planting new trees.
First identified in Illinois in 2006, the emerald ash borer was detected in Lake Forest by 2009, said Chuck Myers, superintendent of parks and forestry for Lake Forest.
At that time, there were 7,227 ash trees in public areas such as parks, parkways and along city streets, Myers said. Ash trees were the second most common tree in public areas, making up about 20 percent of the total tree population, he said.
Originally from Asia, the emerald ash borer is small enough to be pictured next to a penny. In its larva stage, the insect feeds on the inner bark of ash trees, disrupting the flow of water and nutrients, according to the Emerald Ash Borer Information Network’s website. There is an injectable insecticide that can work if the infestation is caught early enough, experts say.
“We started doing different types of treatment in 2009,” said Corey Wierema, who recently became Lake Forest’s city forester. “We were finding larva chest-high. Trees had probably been infected five years before that.”
That’s too late for most of the infected trees, he said.
About 600 ash trees in the city continue to be injected with insecticide every two years, Wierema said. More than 5,000 infested ash trees have been removed, largely by contractors, city officials said.
More Top Picks Agility Ladder
From 2013 to present, the city has paid $730,500 to contractors to remove infested trees with an additional $97,500 spent on treatment and $300,500 on planting replacement trees, Myers said.
“We’re finishing the majority of our removals by the end of this winter,” he said. “Now we’re shifting our emphasis to planting. We have been planting 300 to 400 trees a year. Over the next couple years we’re going to bump that up a bit.”
“We’re hoping to plant a little over 500 trees in spring and fall this year,” Wierema said. “In future years, a lot depends on the budget.”
Myers said he doesn’t think all the removed trees will be replaced, partially due to budget constraints and partially due to not having the manpower to plant or take care of the trees.
“We don’t want to happen what already happened with ash and elms,” Myers said. “When you have a single species that dominates the landscape, the whole population is vulnerable.”
The city will focus on planting a variety of different species with an emphasis on native ones, officials said.
Among those replacements will be oaks, Kentucky coffee and hackberry trees, Myers said.
Twitter: @reporterdude