| December 3, 2008 Beetles. They may be our friends after all
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(NECN: Amy Sinclair, Maine) - The state of Maine has called up troops from Virginia to combat a menace that's already wreaked havoc in the forests of Southern New England. The new "troops" are small enough to sit on the head of a pin, but they are big eaters.
The little white dots, resembling snow, contain an invasive aphidlike-insects called hemlock wooly adelgid.
Long a problem in states to the south, the adelgid is an unwelcome newcomer in Maine's southernmost county. And, it is already causing problems for wholesale growers like David Linney at Groundnut Hill Nursery in Cape Neddick.
The Maine Forest Service is hoping to curtail the wooly adelgid's hungry march north with beetles. The tiny laricobius nigrinus feeds exclusively on adelgids.
Entimologist Allison Kanoti is carefully placing the beetles on a stand of infected eastern hemlocks on land owned and harvested by the York Water District.
There are roughly 670,000 acres of hemlock in Maine, or 6% of the forest. Losing these Maine native could have a devastating impact on both the economy and the environment. Hemlocks provide critical habitat for deer and other mammals. The soft wood is also harvested and used by Maine's pulp and paper industry.
Dave Linney says he's lost business because of the infestation, but that's nothing compared to the possibility of losing Maine's hemlocks, which is why he and the Forest Service are hoping the little laricobious nigrinus has a
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