Banned Firewood for Sale

  • Logs from ash trees that had to be cut down after they were infested with emerald ash borer beetles. (Photo by Rebecca Williams)

In more and more places, you can’t bring firewood with you when you go
camping. That’s because officials are worried about a destructive
beetle that people are spreading by moving firewood all over the
nation. Scientists say the best thing you can do is buy firewood where
you camp. But as Rebecca Williams reports, even then… you can’t
always know if the wood you’re buying is safe:

Transcript

In more and more places, you can’t bring firewood with you when you go
camping. That’s because officials are worried about a destructive
beetle that people are spreading by moving firewood all over the
nation. Scientists say the best thing you can do is buy firewood where
you camp. But as Rebecca Williams reports, even then… you can’t
always know if the wood you’re buying is safe:


(Sound of crackling fire)


There’s something sort of magical about a fire. Without it, there’d be
no roasted marshmallows, no ghost stories. And it would get pretty cold at
night. That’s why a lot of people toss some firewood in their car on
the way to camp out. It’s just habit.


But lately it’s gotten risky to move firewood. That wood could be
carrying tiny stowaways with big appetites. Especially a metallic
green beetle called the emerald ash borer.


The ash borer eats through the living layer of ash trees, so the trees
starve to death. It’s thought to have gotten into the States in wood
packing material from China. So far, it’s killed more than 20 million
ash trees in the upper Midwest and Ontario. That’s costing
millions of dollars in lost trees and wood.


People can move the beetle long distances unknowingly by moving
firewood, because the bug hides underneath the bark.


Elizabeth Pentico is trying to stop people from moving that infested
wood. She’s with the U.S. Department of Agriculture. She supervises
USDA inspectors looking for people moving firewood out of quarantined
states:


“If someone has a shipment of logs that’s fairly easy to see, but 25
pieces of firewood in the back of a pickup truck with a camper is a
whole different issue. The firewood pathway is very difficult because
it is so low profile and because everyone moves firewood.”


Pentico says the best thing to do is buy firewood locally… and burn it
all up. But she says a lot of times, if you buy it from a gas station,
supermarket, or home improvement store, there won’t be any way to know
for sure if the firewood is safe.


Recently, that’s been a problem. Firewood from a company in Illinois
was shipped to Menard’s home improvement stores in 10 states. Illinois
is under a federal quarantine for emerald ash borer. So no hardwood
firewood can cross state lines, unless it’s been treated to kill
emerald ash borer larvae.


But somebody messed up.


Jane Larson is a spokesperson with the Wisconsin Department of
Agriculture. She says in this case, the firewood company had an
agreement with the federal government to ship firewood across state
lines:


“Part of that agreement is they’d sell wood that had the bark removed,
or it would be ‘debarked.’ And we were finding here that the wood was not
debarked.”


Larson says a nationwide recall was put in place. But she says a few
Menard’s stores were still selling the firewood a week after the recall
notice was issued.


In a written statement to The Environment Report, a Menard’s
spokesperson says quote – “Menard’s was in complete cooperation with
the USDA firewood recall and has obtained a new vendor.”


But officials say this incident shows how easily the ash borer can
spread.


USDA’s Elizabeth Pentico says even if you buy a firewood
bundle that says it’s from Texas, that doesn’t mean that’s where the
firewood came from:


“We had a distribution center here in Michigan. The broker for the
firewood was in Texas. The wood itself came out of Missouri and the
wood was distributed to Ohio and Indiana.”


So you can see, firewood can travel around a lot.


You can even buy firewood on eBay, by the semi-load. Pentico says her
inspectors have to watch the Net closely:


“They’ve even come across some firewood chatrooms that have firewood sales.
You can indicate that firewood is illegal. The officers stopped a sale
of Michigan firewood going to California by just typing in and saying
you know, that’s an illegal movement.”


But Pentico says officers do have to catch the wood actually crossing
state lines before the laws can be enforced.


Some people in the firewood industry agree it’s like hide and seek for
inspectors.


Jim Albring is a firewood dealer who’s been in the business for more
than 25 years:


“A lot of firewood business is done by little individuals, guys that
cut on the weekends and so forth, and you try to change the mindset of those people
and say you can’t cut ash, you can’t sell ash, well they’re going to
cut what they want to cut. They’re individuals… and if there’s ash in
it, so there’s ash in it.”


The inspectors say it’s very hard even for a trained eye to tell the
difference between ash wood that might be infested and any other kind
of wood that’s safe. So they say the best thing to do is to not move
firewood at all. Buy local and burn it up as soon as you can.


For the Environment Report, I’m Rebecca Williams.

Related Links

Firewood Fuels Ash Borer Problem

  • A live adult emerald ash borer. (Photo by Jodie Ellis, Purdue University)

If you’re packing up the car for a camping trip, you can’t
leave without the marshmallows and duct tape and bug spray, but
in more and more places, you can’t take firewood with you. That’s because government officials are worried about a destructive beetle
that people are spreading by moving firewood. The GLRC’s
Rebecca Williams reports:

Transcript

If you’re packing up the car for a camping trip, you can’t leave without the
marshmallows and duct tape and bug spray, but in more and more places, you
can’t take firewood with you. That’s because government officials are
worried about a destructive beetle that people are spreading by moving
firewood. The GLRC’s Rebecca Williams reports:


(Sound of RV humming)


Butch Sloan can’t imagine camping without a fire:


“Sitting back and watching the wood burn and kinda dreaming about old times
or whatever, you know? That’s part of your camping. Yeah, you gotta have
your camp fire!”


Sloan’s been coming to this Michigan campground from his home in Ohio for 20
years now. For the past few years, it’s been illegal for anyone to move
hardwood firewood over the state line. There can be steep fines if you’re
caught.


That’s because of the emerald ash borer. It’s an invader from Asia that’s
killing millions of ash trees in the upper Midwest. Moving just one piece
of infested firewood can start a new outbreak. Beetles can emerge from the
wood and fly to healthy ash trees.


Butch Sloan says he brings wood from construction sites or buys firewood at
the campground instead:


“As far as trying to bring regular firewood across the state lines, the fines
are just too high. I don’t want to take a chance on it, you know? We bring
the two by fours and stuff like that, and that’s good fire, good cooking, you
know!”


But there are plenty of campers who ignore the laws and bring firewood with
them. That’s why states such as Michigan and Ohio are setting up
checkpoints along highways. They’re trying to catch people sneaking
firewood out of infested areas.


(Sound of traffic)


Here on a two lane country road in Northwest Ohio, every car and truck is
being stopped. State workers ask the drivers if they’ve got firewood.


“If we do find someone that has brought firewood with them, we ask them to
pull into a parking lot and at that point we begin to interview them to find
out where the firewood came from.”


Stephanie Jaqua is a crew leader with the Ohio Department of Agriculture.
She says a lot of the people they catch don’t understand the quarantine
laws. But she says others don’t think they’re part of the problem:


“We have had people in the past say there’s no ash in the back of my truck, you know,
there’s no way I’m transporting emerald ash borer, and then you get to the
bottom and there are four pieces of ash in the bottom.”


Jaqua says that’s why the laws are written the way they are. It’s illegal
to move any hardwood firewood out of quarantined areas, not just ash wood.
Jaqua says the best thing campers can do is buy firewood where they camp and
burn it all up at the site.


A lot of campers say the firewood rules are annoying, but the rules have
changed everything for some people.


Jim Albring owns Lumber Jacks Quality Firewood. His business is in
Michigan, just a mile and a half from Ohio. He says before the ash borer
arrived, most of his customers were in Ohio. Then, suddenly, he couldn’t
move firewood across the state line.


“It was profitable and we were increasing by 25-30% a year until the ash
borer hit. And now we’ve dropped uh, boy, I don’t even know. I don’t really
look at the figures too much any more because it’s disheartening.”


Albring says at first, he could only sell to people a few miles away in
Michigan, so his customer base totally dropped out. He says these days,
people from Ohio still drive up and try to buy firewood from him.


“If we know or we’re suspicious it’s going back to Ohio, we tell them how
heavy the fines are and then they usually back off right away and they don’t
try to get it.”


That’s the problem with trying to stop the destructive insect from spreading
across the country. Even government officials admit there’s no way to stop
every single person from moving firewood.


Patricia Lockwood directs ash borer policy for Michigan:


“I think it’s going to be extremely difficult and we’ve known that from day
one, to stop it. What we have always agreed on is we’re buying ourselves
time. What we’re looking for is time so that the science can catch up.”


And researchers are scrambling to find something that will stop the ash
borer, a natural predator or a perfect pesticide. But scientists say
states have to contain the infestations in the meantime.


That means there’s a lot of pressure on campers and hunters to change their
habits. Tossing some wood in the back of the truck on the way up north used
to be pretty harmless. Now it’s changing entire landscapes, as millions of
trees get wiped out by the beetle.


For the GLRC, I’m Rebecca Williams.

Related Links