Report suspected infestations to the USDA APHIS Emerald Ash Borer Hotline (866) 322-4512 or the Office of the State Entomologist. (859) 257-5838

2008 EAB Activities

This spring personnel from the Office of the State Entomologist will distribute 3,600 EAB traps to survey for EAB adults. In Boone, Kenton, and Campbell counties (yellow band) one trap will be placed for every 2.25 square miles. The rest of the trapping area (blue band) will have one trap per 4 square miles. Sites will include nurseries, state parks, campgrounds, and sawmills. Traps also will be placed in areas with high tourist traffic - Land Between the Lakes, Bernheim Arboretum, Mammoth Cave Mational Park and Lake Cumberland.

Trap placement will begin in May and continue into early June so that they will be in place when adult flight begins in May. Traps will be checked throughtout the season and removed in September. Anyone interested in volunteering their ash trees as trap sites should contact Janet Lensing, state survey coordinator.

2007 EAB Survey Activities

• A site along I-75 in Georgetown was investigated on November 8 and was negative.
• Suspected reports from Florence and Union were investigated during September and were determined not to be EAB.
• All rest stops along Kentucky portions of I-64 have been visited during late July and early August, as well as I-75 from Lexington to Cincinnati, and portions of I-71. No signs of crown dieback or EAB activity noted.
• August 7 - Dead or declining ash trees along Rte 8 between I-275 bridge and Tower Hill Road were visited. No signs of EAB activity were detected.
• August 2 Boone County Arboretum - stress ash trees examined, as well as trees near Prisoner's Lake and along the nature trail at Devou Park.
• July 10 Devou Park, Covington, no EAB signs on stressed ash, large ash at Devou Park
• July - 2 follow-up visits from northern Kentucky homeowners to the EAB Hotline. In one case the dead trees were not ash, in the other no EAB activity was detected, Other species of trees also were showing dieback and decline from unknown causes. Street ash at a commercial park north of the Cincinnati- Northern Ky airport were inspected.
• July - specimen submitted from Boone county was a buprestid but not the EAB.

Quick Ash Facts for Kentucky

• According to the Ky Division of Forestry, there are 130.9 million stems of white ash and 92.5 million stems of green ash in the Commonwealth.
• According to the Forest Invertory and Analysis Factsheet for Kentucky 2004, the elm-ash-cottonwood component is 6% of the Commonwealth's 11.7 million forested acres. This type has been defined as the lowland forests where American elm (Ulmus americana), green ash (Fraxinus pennsylvanica), eastern cottonwood (Populus deltoides) or silver maple (Acer saccharinum) comprise singly, or in any combination, the largest component of stocking. It occupies a large but irregular area on the floodplains and bottomlands of the north central United States. (Shifley and Brown 1978).
• Ash component of Boone, Campbell, and Kenton counties is estimated at 14.5% of more than 56 million trees. White ash (F. americana) is the predominant species followed by green ash, and blue ash (F. quadrangulata). (Ky Div Forestry 2007
• Based on a 2005 Lexington street tree survey, ash species comprised almost 11% of about 51,000 street trees. It is estimated that there are more than 10,000 ash trees in the Urban Service Area. (LFUCG 2007)

Movement of infested firewood is a major means of spreading the emerald ash borer. Quarantines have been established in states with confirmed infestations to stop the spread of the insect through infested wood products. Buy local firewood.

• Indiana
• Ohio
• Illinois
• Michigan

USDA Forest Service EAB site