Utah officials declare war on Japanese beetles
17 May, 2007 LM Direct!OREM, UT — The Utah Department of Agriculture and Food has declared all out war on n Japanese beetles after their discovery this past year on residential properties in this city of 85,000 residents in north-central Utah.
On Tuesday, May 15, department officials announced an infestation emergency declaration and said they had hired TruGreen ChemLawn of Utah at $400,000 per year to eradicate the pest. The effort could take as many as three years, said the officials were quoted in an article in the Daily Herald.
The Japanese beetle is an imported pest that was first detected in New Jersey in 1916. As larvae they feed on roots and can severely damage turfgrass, ornamentals and vegetables. Japanese beetle adults feed on hundreds of varieties of broad-leaved plants. It is almost exclusively found in the East, but occasionally turns up in the West, generally, it is believed, inadvertently shipped in commerce..
Utah officials fear that the spread of the pest could threaten the state’s fruit and vegetable industry and result in a quarantine being put on their plants by other states.
TruGreen ChemLawn is reportedly using Merit insecticide to kill the pest on properties within an area of the city deemed to be at risk from the pest. Meanwhile, officials have begun an education program to gain cooperation and to educate homeowners about the Japanese beetle, and why it has to be eradicated in Utah.
Click here to read the Daily Herald article about Utah’s efforts to kill every Japanese beetle in the state.
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