Kill The Spotted Lanternfly and The Tree of Heaven — An Online Forum

The Spotted Lanternfly is now making it’s way east, following the highways and the train lines, clustering on trees, with the worst yet to come.  The Spotted Lanternfly was only recently introduced here in 2012 as a ‘stowaway’:

Spotted lanternfly (SLF), Lycorma delicatula, an invasive planthopper native to China, is thought to have arrived as egg masses on a stone shipment in 2012. That first infestation was found in Berks County, Pennsylvania, in 2014 in a wooded area of Ailanthus altissima, or Tree of Heaven.”

Cornell College of Agriculture and Life Sciences

The Tree of Heaven by contrast, was introduced here in the 1700’s as an exotic from China.  Like any non-native plant, it is invisible to native insects, and therefore has been a landscaper’s favorite.   They call such plants exotics or ornamentals.   You will hardly ever find an insect bite on them UNLESS that insect is also non-native, and is adapted to feed off that plant.

For The Spotted Lanternfly, The Tree Heaven is “home cooking.”   They will spread to where there is Tree of Heaven growing.  And the problem is, it is now growing about everywhere, along our highways, trainlines, and in our public parks and forests and The Spotted Lanternfly is right there with them.

In this public discussion of the tree and the fly, we will discuss how to identify and kill the Tree of Heaven,  as well as how we may defend our farms and properties from the spotted lanternfly.

REGISTER HERE TO BE A PART OF THE DISCUSSION THURSDAY SEPT 7TH 11-12.

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