Like their namesakes, gypsy moths have taken to journeying across the country, starting in Massachusetts and spreading as far west as Wisconsin and as far south as Virginia’s border with North Carolina.
As the invasive species spreads, so does concern about defoliation in its wake.
The Berks County Conservation District has begun the process to spray parts of the county in 2016 to combat the destruction caused by the moth. Dean Druckenmiller, the assistant district executive of the Berks Conservation District, presented the program Thursday at the Berks County Commissioners’ meeting.
“They hatch from April. They are very distinctive caterpillars, and that starts the defoliation and destruction that they cause, the destruction in our forests in Pennsylvania,” Druckenmiller said.
A program through the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources would spray residential areas and surrounding forest that met a certain criteria. Druckenmiller said that the aim was not eradication of the insects, but to decrease the impact they have on local woodlands.
“It is not an eradication program. That was tried in the early 1900s, there was an attempt to burn them out that didn’t work well. This is meant to prevent 30 percent of defoliation on 80 percent of the canopy,” he said.
The criteria for ‘spray blocks’ or areas that will be treated, is for there to be a residence within 200 feet of the tree line of a forest, that trees must cover at least 50 percent of the property and there must be a certain density of moth eggs on the property. A spray block must also be at least 23 contiguous acres, but neighboring properties can join together to meet that requirement.
According to the DCNR, forest insect spraying programs began in 1972, a cooperative effort among DCNR, county governments and the U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service’s Forest Health Protection Unit. County governments share the cost of treating private residential and local government-owned lands for gypsy moth suppression.
Druckenmiller told commissioners that before spraying began, the county would have to enter into an agreement to commit funds to the project, though no action was needed at the Thursday meeting.
Commissioner Christian Leinbach said the commissioners had already received an estimate of about $16,000 in cost to the county. He emphasized the importance of taking action against the winged pests.
“On the north side, they got hammered there,” Leinbach said. “The other side of the mountain, the Schuylkill County side of the mountain, we do not want to wait until we have that kind of devastation here.”
