City unveils $6 million, six year plan to control ash tree beetle

kingstonregion.com
Nov. 13, 2014
By Bill Hutchins

Kingston is getting ready to wage war against an invasive beetle that threatens to destroy thousands of ash trees in the city.

But this battle will almost certainly cause casualties in neighbourhoods.

“This is, generally speaking, a huge increase over our current tree budget,” said Jim Keech, president of Utilities Kingston.

The city has unveiled a plan to spend $1 million a year over the next six years to control the spread of the emerald ash borer (EAB), which is already munching its way through some of the city’s 3,589 ash trees. That figure doesn’t include the number of ash trees on private property.

The costly strategy involves treating some ash trees, while removing the vast majority of them.

“Probably,” said Keech, when asked if most ash trees will have to be cut down.

The proposed budget, which will soon be presented to councillors, also includes money to plant hundreds of new tree species.

A cost mitigation plan, prepared by Davey Resource Group, outlines the scope of the problem which other municipalities have also encountered. “EAB infestations have already killed 150-200 million ash throughout North America,” the consultant wrote.

The Asian beetle is believed to have arrived in North America in wood packaging material in 2002. Since first being detected in Windsor the beetle has spread aggressively through southern Ontario.

The arrival of the dreaded beetle in Kingston was first confirmed in July 2013.

Ash trees represent about 12 per cent of the city’s urban canopy. The consultant says the goal is to save about 600 healthy, mature trees by injecting them with a special chemical and to remove the remaining 3,000 trees.

Trees invaded by the centimetre-long dark metallic green beetle typically lose 30 to 50 per cent of their canopies within the first year, and the trees will die over the course of two to six years. While mature beetles feed on the leaf edges, the larvae tunnel through the bark hampering the tree’s ability to transport water and nutrients from its roots to its canopy. An infected tree is, essentially, starved to death.

Kingston’s recommended mitigation plan includes launching an extensive communications strategy to help residents identify the beetles and decide the best method to deal with their trees, and to educate them on what the city plans to do.

“Tree removal can be controversial and cause emotions to run high,” the consultant noted.

Among the concerns the city can expect to encounter from homeowners; the city is removing trees prematurely, a desire to retain street trees in front of their property, a desire to remove a sick tree for safety and aesthetic concerns, and a desire to choose the species of replacement trees.

While the city is responsible for dealing with infected trees in municipal parks and along the road allowance, Keech says homeowners with ash trees will likely get no compensation for treatment or removal. “If it’s on private property it’s the homeowner’s responsibility. You’re going to see it start to decay. You could be pro-active and take it down.”

Here’s a cost breakdown of the proposed one million dollar annual capital budget:

• $700,000 to remove and dispose of about 300 to 500 ash trees a year
• $200,000 for new tree planting
• $60,000 for injection treatment of selected trees
• $20,000 for public education

While the proposed $6 million budget, running from 2014 to 2019, is unlikely to affect property tax rates, it could siphon money from other capital priorities such as road work. “We are dealing with a lot of it as capital costs,” Keech explained.

He likens the EAB to the destructive force of Dutch elm disease which devastated the city’s tree canopy in the 1970s and 80s.