Posts Tagged: ISHB
Shot Hole Borer Volunteer Training
Attend our training to become an invasive shothole borer monitor!
*Results from March 2023 ISHB Monitors Training*
Invasive shothole borers (ISHB) are wood boring beetles that attack many native and non-native trees in Southern California. These beetles bore tunnels into trunks and branches where they grow a fungus they use as food. The fungus causes a disease called Fusarium Dieback. Trees infected with Fusarium Dieback show branch dieback, canopy loss, and may eventually die. Infested trees become sources of beetles that can spread to surrounding hosts. This pest can also spread long distances through infested green waste and firewood, affecting new areas.
How you can help: Get trained, become an ISHB Monitor, and help us gather infestation data! In previous editions of the program, we learned that trained volunteers can identify ISHB-infested trees with 96% accuracy. This high accuracy of volunteer observations allows us to include the data collected through this program directly into the ISHB statewide distribution map. Knowing where beetles have spread will assist scientists, municipalities, and many other conservation agencies plan for management. Also, detecting infestations in their early stages allow for better chances of successful management. Your participation is needed to detect infestations throughout southern California.
Training for Monitors: You can become an ISHB monitor trained by scientists from UC Agriculture and Natural Resources. California Naturalists, Project Learning Tree Educators, and Master Gardeners are especially encouraged to attend, but curious minds of all ages are welcome.
Dates: Online training 7/7/2023. In person dates Ventura County 7/8/2023, Santa Barbara County 7/9/2023, San Diego County 7/14/2023, and Inland Empire (Riverside County or San Bernardino County) 7/15/2023 (specific locations to be determined).
Cost: Free.
Training Requirements:
- Registration is required.
- Attendance to online session is required.
- Attendance to one in-person session is required.
- Completion of the 1-hour free online eXtension Invasive Shothole Borer training is required.
- Monitors must create or already have a free account on iNaturalist.
- After the training, monitors must upload at least 5 observations to the UC ANR ISHB Monitoring Project on iNaturalist using the correct protocols ( UC ANR Invasive Shothole Borer Monitoring Project iNaturalist Guide ).
Note: Past participants of this program may choose not to attend the online session, but in-person session is required. Please make sure you contact us and let us know beforehand if you will not attend the online training.
AGENDA:
Pre-training assignments: before 7/7/2023 Complete 1-hour free online eXtension Invasive Shothole Borer training and make an account on iNaturalist. |
Online session: 7/7/2023 (12pm-2pm) Location: Virtual Zoom meeting. The meeting access information will be sent to registrants prior to training. Speakers will cover how this project fits into the big picture of efforts to manage emerging tree pests in California. There will be a short review of ISHB identification, look-alikes and tree species identification, and then an overview of how to use iNaturalist for this project. |
In person training: Participants may choose which field training to attend, all sessions cover the same material. Attendance at one of the sessions is mandatory. Ventura County 7/8/2023, Santa Barbara County 7/9/2023, San Diego County 7/14/2023, and Inland Empire (Riverside County or San Bernardino County) 7/15/2023 (specific locations to be determined). Speakers will review ISHB symptoms and iNaturalist collection protocols ( UC ANR Invasive Shothole Borer Monitoring Project iNaturalist Guide ), observation of infested trees and filed identification of signs and symptoms, and troubleshooting based on their experiences with the practice observation. |
Deadline for iNaturalist observations: 8/14/2023 After the training, monitors must upload at least 5 observations to the UC ANR ISHB Monitoring Project on iNaturalist using the correct protocols ( UC ANR Invasive Shothole Borer Monitoring Project iNaturalist Guide ) by 8/14/2023. |
Results: end of August 2023 After volunteer data has been evaluated, results will be shared will all participants. See results from March 2023 ISHB monitors training. |
Stay tuned for additional events! |
Registration
Please register here by 7/3/2023.
Contact
Questions or more information about the training can be directed to:
Hannah Vasilis - Statewide ISHB Survey and Trapping Coordinator
ishb sycamore
Invasive Shothole Borers Threaten California’s Urban Forests
When tiny tree-killing beetles first arrived in Southern California several years ago and began...
Fig 1 Adult female of Polyhagous shot hole borer
Fig 2 Beetle entry hole on an avocado branch
Fig 3 a close up picture of broken branch of red willow tree in OC parks
After shothole borer invasion, UC Irvine becomes ‘perfect testing ground’
Results help inform best practices for managing the disease-causing beetle
The University of California, Irvine campus is home to a vast urban forest consisting of approximately 30,000 trees located in a mix of landscape, riparian and open space settings. In the mid-2010s, that forest came under threat from an invasive species of beetle that arborists and pest researchers were just learning about – the polyphagous shothole borer.
The tiny beetles, which may have arrived in California from their native Southeast Asia via infested shipping materials, tunnel into trees and introduce a fungus that serves as food for adult beetles and their larva.
As the fungus grows, it colonizes the tree's vascular system, blocking transport of water and nutrients. This causes a disease called Fusarium dieback that can kill branches or entire trees.
One reason the beetles were such a threat at UCI was the high number of sycamores on campus, especially in Aldrich Park at the campus center. Hundreds of cottonwoods, native willows, golden rain and coral trees also were affected. In total, the beetles attacked more than 2,000 trees, including 75 different tree species.
A variety of approaches to controlling beetle
To better understand and tackle this problem, UCI's Facilities Management department and Office of Environmental Planning and Sustainability collaborated with researchers affiliated with UC Agriculture and Natural Resources and UC Cooperative Extension. In addition, pesticide-manufacturing companies, pest control advisers and arborists provided materials and labor to help offset the cost of research.
“UCI was the perfect testing ground to determine integrated pest management strategies for this beetle/disease complex,” said John Kabashima, UCCE environmental horticulture advisor emeritus. “Our research was multifaceted, delving into early detection, monitoring and sampling, and cultural and chemical management.”
Kabashima said UCI provided the researchers with “a lot of freedom” to try a variety of approaches and study the results over time.
“We could cut down and sample trees or leave selected infested trees alone; we explored a variety of pesticide/fungicide combinations and application techniques,” he said. “That freedom resulted in many of the management solutions that are used today to effectively control this pest.”
UCI and the researchers also established a full inventory of affected trees on campus, evaluating severity of infestation by the number of entry/exit holes and signs of dieback. One important key to management is getting rid of “amplifiers” – heavily infested trees that are both hazardous and a source of beetles to spread to other trees.
“Typically, shothole borer infestations begin with just a few trees that for some reason are highly attractive to the beetles – perhaps based on tree species, tree spacing, irrigation conditions or other factors,” Kabashima said. “Over time, the beetles and fungus multiply largely undetected in those few trees. When the beetle population reaches a critical point and the trees begin to die, the female beetles fly to adjacent trees in a secondary invasion, eventually infesting many trees over a large area.”
An opportunity to diversify UCI's urban forest
At UCI, that initial invasion took place in landscaped areas containing many large, majestic sycamores that were planted when the campus began operations in the mid-1960s.
Over several years, UCI removed 700 heavily infested trees, including many of those historic sycamores, and replaced them with other tree species.
Today, the forest at UCI is very different than it was in 2015. While shothole borers have not been eliminated completely, their presence is reduced significantly, and UCI now has the tools to manage them effectively. Reforestation efforts resulted in a diverse treescape that is not only more sustainable but also beautiful.
“Managing a 1,500-acre campus with 30,000 trees is a never-ending process,” said Richard Demerjian, UCI's assistant vice chancellor, Campus Physical & Environmental Planning. “Our forest continues to evolve, with an ongoing focus on increasing diversity and plant health.”
Demerjian also noted that UCI is now starting to consider planting new sycamore trees on a limited basis.
A primer on effective shothole borer management
Whether managing a forest of thousands of trees or just a few trees, landscape managers and residents can apply many of the lessons learned at UCI to control invasive shothole borers and other tree pests.
- Avoid monocultures. Tree diversity provides beauty and resiliency.
- Keep trees healthy. Proper irrigation and maintenance will keep trees strong and help protect them from shothole borers and other pests.
- Check trees. Look for the common signs and symptoms of infestation such as beetle entry/exit holes. Regular monitoring ensures that infestations are managed early, before they cause dieback or tree death.
- Confirm suspected infestations. Use the detection tool at www.ishb.org.
- Review management options. For trees with low infestation, prune the infested branches and monitor the tree's health over time. In non-riparian, urban settings, consider treating low and moderately infested trees with pesticides/fungicides demonstrated to be effective against the pest-disease complex (A licensed professional will be needed to apply the treatments). Severely infested trees may require removal.
- Call in a professional. A certified arborist or pest control professional would be able to provide recommendations based on the tree's condition. The local county Agricultural Commissioner's Office and UC Cooperative Extension office may have additional knowledge about current shothole borer monitoring and management programs in your area.
- Take care of green waste. The beetles can survive in cut wood for weeks or even months. Proper disposal of green waste includes chipping infested wood, followed by solarizing or composting the chips.
- Replant wisely. Begin planting new trees only after removing all amplifiers and establishing an ongoing monitoring program. Consider the current concentration of tree species when deciding what type of trees to plant.
Shothole Borer Seminar at Long Beach Landscape Expo
UCCE's Dr. Beatriz Nobua-Behrmann will present "Using an Integrated Pest Management Approach to...
Beetle:Fungus Symbiosis?
Origin and evolution of fungus farming in wood-boring Coleoptera – a palaeontological perspective
David Peris, Xavier Delclòs, Bjarte Jordal https://doi.org/10.1111/brv.12763
A beetle bores a tree trunk to build a gallery in the wood in order to protect its lay. As it digs the tunnel, it spreads ambrosia fungal spores that will feed the larvae. When these bore another tree, the adult beetles will be the transmission vectors of the fungal spores in another habitat. This mutualism among insects and ambrosia fungi could be more than 100 years old --more than what was thought to date-- according to an article published in the journal Biological Reviews.
The study analyses for the first time the symbiotic associations and the coevolution between ambrosia fungi and beetles from a paleontological perspective using the Cretaceous fossil records of these biological groups. Among the authors of the study are the experts David Peris and Xavier Delclòs, from the Faculty of Earth Sciences and the Biodiversity Research Institute of the University of Barcelona (IRBio), and Bjarte Jordal, from the University of Bergen (Norway).
Beetles that grew fungi millions of years before human agriculture
Some termites, ants and beetles developed the ability to grow fungi in order to eat millions of years ago. This mutualism between insects and fungi --one of the top studied symbiosis in the natural field-- is an analogous evolutionary strategy in the farming activities of the human species since the Neolithic revolution.
Understanding the origins of the symbiosis between insects and fungi is a field of interest in several scientific disciplines. Nowadays, the mutualism between ambrosia symbiont beetles and fungi is the cause of forest and crop plagues that cause serious ecological and economic losses "it remains unclear which ecological factors facilitated the origin of fungus farming and how it transformed into a symbiotic relationship with obligate dependency", notes David Peris, first author of the study.
When did the lineage of farming insects begin?
Historically, phylogenetic studies suggest beetle fungiculture started more than 50 million years ago --before other insects-- and some studies dated it back to 86 million years ago. "The symbiotic relationship between fungus and beetles would have probably originated more than 100 million years ago, during the early Cretaceous, in groups of beetles that had gone unnoticed", reveals the expert David Peris.
As part of the study, the experts studied several specimens of worldwide distribution of the biological groups captured in amber from the Cretaceous. Therefore, the origin of ambrosia fungus is older than the main groups of beetles from the subfamilies Scolytinae and Platypodinae --Curculionidae family-- which now grow fungus in tree trunks, as stated by the authors.
"This suggests that these fungi used some other group of insects to spread millions of years ago", notes the researcher. Also, other beetle groups with a similar behaviour to ambrosia beetles --Bostrichidae and mostly Lymexylidae families-- present an older and abundant fossil record that would coincide with the emergence of ambrosia fungi, according to previous studies.
"The most interesting thing --he continues-- is that some studies note the ability to cultivate fungi in some of these current species".
Evolutionary convergence towards an obligate mutualism
The growing process of fungi starts when beetles colonize a new tree trunk or branch. During the Cretaceous, the abundance of fungi and wood-boring beetles facilitated a starting domestication of some groups of fungi. First, the fungal spores were accidentally transported from tree to tree by the wood-boring beetles "until this mutually beneficial association evolved towards a more intimate symbiosis in which fungi were inoculated into to a tree, the fungal mycelia grew and beetle larvae fed from the fungus", notes Bjarte Jordal.
This set of factors, together with the symbionts' high ability to adapt and change, eased the morphological and ecological adaptations of biological groups that converged in an obligated mutualism. That is, a symbiotic relationship between insects and fungi, beneficial for both, which still lasts.
"However, we need more studies on the knowledge of the ecology of the species from the Lymexylidae and Bostrichidae families to get more specific conclusions. Therefore, the discovery of new fossils in cretaceous amber of these groups will certainly help us to better understand the evolutionary history of this symbiotic relationship that still exists nowadays", concludes Professor Xavier Delclòs.
Read on: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/brv.12763
Photo: Invasive Shot Hole Borer tunnels in Box Elder trunk
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shot hole borer feeding