Tag: pests

Seed Bank Hopes to Save Trees in Peril

  • Examples of ash tree seeds that are part of the collection effort. (Photo by Lester Graham)

People have been saving seeds for thousands of years. Gardeners save
seeds of their favorite plants. Governments save seeds to protect
their food crops. Now, some people are freezing the seeds from trees.
That’s because the trees are being destroyed by an insect pest.
Rebecca Williams reports they’re hoping a gene bank will protect the
trees’ DNA and some day help bring the trees back:

Transcript

People have been saving seeds for thousands of years. Gardeners save
seeds of their favorite plants. Governments save seeds to protect
their food crops. Now, some people are freezing the seeds from trees.
That’s because the trees are being destroyed by an insect pest.
Rebecca Williams reports they’re hoping a gene bank will protect the
trees’ DNA and some day help bring the trees back:


Seeds are a pretty amazing little package. They might be small, but
they’re tough. They can live through very dry and very cold
conditions.


(Sound of seed being shaken out of a paper bag)


These seeds are from ash trees. In some parts of the Upper Midwest and
Ontario, ash trees have been wiped out. The seeds are all that’s left.
That’s because of the emerald ash borer. It’s a tiny green beetle that
got into the US in cargo shipped from China. So far, the beetles have
killed 20 million ash trees. No one’s been able to stop the beetles
from spreading.


David Burgdorf works for a lab with the US Department of Agriculture.
He says people might not even know they had ash trees until the trees
got attacked:


“If your lawn was filled with the ash tree and you had all this great
shade and your energy bills were low, but now the ash tree’s gone, you
only miss it when it’s gone.”


Burgdorf says a lot of people love ash trees for their gold and purple
fall colors. They grow fast and hold up well under ice storms. Native
American tribes depend on black ash for making baskets and medicine.


David Burgdorf is trying to make sure ash trees won’t disappear completely
if the beetle spreads across the country. He’s gathering ash seeds
sent in by volunteers. He’s hoping to build a collection that
represents the entire ash tree gene pool:


“We want to try not to have to bring something back. We don’t want it
to be extinct. It’s important we at least save the seed so we can maybe cross
it, or do something, breed in resistance to the tree and have it
available to come back.”


Burgdorf says he thinks of the seeds as an investment for the future.
The seeds are definitely being treated like a precious commodity.
They’re sorted and they’re X-rayed to make sure the living embryos in
the seeds haven’t been damaged.


Then, the very best seeds in the bunch are off to a high security
government vault:


“We kind of joke that it’s the Fort Knox for seeds.”


Dave Ellis is the seed curator at the National Center for Genetic
Resources Preservation. It’s a giant seed bank. Ellis says the ash
seeds are dehydrated and frozen at 0 degrees Fahrenheit. These steps
put the seeds into a deep sleep:


“In a dehydrated state, degradation of DNA happens much more slowly,
over a course of tens of years or hundreds of years.”


Ellis says the ash seeds should be viable for at least 25 years, if not
longer. He says researchers might be able to use the stored genetic
material to breed new pest-resistant ash trees in the future. Ellis
sees gene banks as a safeguard against a world that’s changing fast.


Scientists say wild plants and crops we depend on will face many new
threats. Climate change might bring more drought.
Escalating global trade could mean importing more pests.


Deb McCullough studies insect pests at Michigan State University. She
says any time you import cargo, you’re running the risk of also
importing pests that can run up huge bills. She says in North America,
one of the big concerns is imports from China:


“If you look at the latitude where China occurs, if you look at the
northern and southern latitude and you overlay that on top of the US and
Canada, it matches up almost perfectly. So you can figure that pretty
much any kind of climate or habitat you find in China, there’s going to
be something similar in the US.”


McCullough says not everything that gets in will turn out to be a pest,
but she says as China’s huge trade surplus with the US grows, there’s a
greater risk more pests will come in.


She says there are some new regulations in place, but restricting
international shipping is a tricky proposition. McCullough says seed
collecting might be one way to preserve plants we rely on:


“People who are molecular biologists, the gene jockeys, have gotten
very good at enhancing or producing resistant varieties of different
kinds of plants. So, that may be something that becomes an option in the
future, maybe not the too distant future.”


McCullough points out there will be serious debate about introducing a
genetically modified tree into the wild. Some people don’t like the
idea of manipulating the genetic makeup of plants or animals.


There are a lot of questions about what might be done with the frozen
seeds, but the seed collectors say regardless, they need to bank up the
DNA of plants that we’re in danger of losing.


For the Environment Report, I’m Rebecca Williams.

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Bugs Boom as Climate Busts?

A new study suggests global warming could bring a boom in bug populations. Rebecca Williams reports that could mean bumper crops of pests:

Transcript

A new study suggests global warming could bring a boom in bug populations. Rebecca Williams reports that could mean bumper crops of pests:


Researchers studied 65 species of insects. They found that insects that are able to adapt to a warming climate will be able to reproduce a lot more quickly.


Melanie Frazier is the lead author of the study, published in the journal American Naturalist. Frazier says in the future, there could be more crop pests and other problems.


“There might also be human health consequences – a lot of bugs are disease carriers, like mosquitoes for instance. And if those populations are growing at a faster rate we might have more difficulty dealing with those.”


Frazier says at this point they can’t predict which species might experience population booms. And she says not all species would do well in a warmer world. Some species might migrate to cooler places, and others might go extinct.


For the Environment Report, I’m Rebecca Williams.

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Scientist Warns of Biofuel Invasives

Some scientists are sounding a warning bell about the rush to plant new biofuel crops. Charlie Schlenker reports they worry the new crops could damage the environment:

Transcript

Some scientists are sounding a warning bell about the rush to plant new biofuel crops. Charlie Schlenker reports they worry the new crops could damage the environment:


The scientists warn many potential Biofuel crops have similarities with plants that have become invasive and damaging to crops and the environment. Ecology Professor Roger Anderson is the co-author of a recent article in the journal Science. He notes plants targeted for biofuel crops such as Miscanthus and switchgrass grow fast:


“They have very high rates of photosynthesis, so they’re gonna yield a lot of biomass. A second feature is that many of these plants also have few enemies and pests and diseases.”


Anderson says no studies have determined whether these plants are likely to get out of hand as kudzu, johnsongrass, and giant reed have. Anderson says invasive alien plants cost U-S agriculture more than $123 billion a year. He worries political pressure to plant new biofuel crops may cause damaging shortcuts.


For the Environment Report, I’m Charlie Schlenker.

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Invasive Species at the Aquarium

  • Asian carp are one of the invasive species featured in the exhibits in your local museums. (Photo courtesy of USFWS)

Big, public aquariums spend a lot of money to make fish look like they’re at home in the wild. But lately some aquariums are showing fish that are out of place. The GLRC’s Shawn Allee looks at one aquarium’s effort to give them the spotlight, too:

Transcript

Big, public aquariums spend a lot of money to make fish look like
they’re at home in the wild, but lately some aquariums are showing fish
that are out of place. The GLRC’s Shawn Allee looks at one aquarium’s
effort to give them the spotlight, too:


The federal government’s spending millions to keep Asian Carp out of
the Great Lakes. Biologists worry Asian Carp could devastate the lakes’
ecosystem. Recently, though, several carp were brought within sight of
the Great Lakes, and biologists are happy about it.


Chicago’s Shedd Aquarium is on the shore of Lake Michigan. It’s
holding an exhibit of Asian Carp and other alien invasive species.


Curator Kurt Hettinger captured the aquarium’s carp during a trip on an
Illinois river.


“They’re literally jumping, sometimes over the bow of the boat,
sometimes smacking into the side of the boat. I just looked behind me
and was amazed to see all these fish jumping in the wake of the boat, and
to this day, I’m still stunned by this.”


And Hettinger’s more than just stunned. He’s worried.


Asian Carp are an invasive species, basically … pests that crowd out
native fish, and that river where he caught them hooks up to Lake
Michigan.


Again, Asian carp haven’t made it to the Great Lakes, but more than one
hundred and sixty other invasive species have arrived and are breeding
quickly.


One example’s the zebra mussel. At first, scientists worried about how
much money it could cost us. Zebra mussels multiply so fast they can
block pipes that carry cooling water to power plants. But now, we know
the zebra mussel’s disrupting the lakes’ natural food chain.


In other words, invasive species are a huge economic and ecological
nuisance. That’s why the Shedd Aquarium started the exhibit.


“The public I think has seen enough stories about the damages and the
spread and the harmfulness, but those stories are not very often coupled
with solutions.”


That’s ecologist David Lodge. He says the exhibit tries to show how
people spread these species around. Lodge points to one exhibit tank. It
looks like a typical backyard water garden. It’s decked out with a small
fishpond, water lilies, even a little fountain shaped like an angel. It looks
pretty innocent, but Lodge says plants and fish you buy for your own
water garden could be invasive species.


“All those plants and animals that are put outside, then have an
opportunity to spread. Now, it doesn’t happen very often, but with the
number of water gardens, it happens enough so that they are a serious
threat to the spread of species.”


Birds or even a quick flood could move seeds or minnows from your
garden to a nearby lake or river.


The Shedd Aquarium’s not alone in spotlighting invasive species.
Several aquariums and science museums are also getting on board. For example one in
Florida shows how invasive species have infested the Everglades.


Shedd curator George Parsons went far and wide for inspiration.


“I was in Japan last year when we were planning this, and I just
happened to stumble across one of their aquariums and they had an
invasive species exhibit, except that they were talking about large mouth
bass and blue gill. You know, something that is our natives. So, it was
kind of ironic to see that out there. It was kind of neat.”


Like us, the Japanese take invasive species seriously. Back in 1999 the
humble Midwestern Blue Gill created a national uproar. Turns out, they
had taken over ponds throughout the Emperor’s palace, and how did the
bluegill get to Japan?


Probably as a gift from a former Chicago mayor. Apparently, the mayor
thought blue gill might make nice sport fishing in Japan. It was an
innocent mistake, but it’s just the kind of mishap biologists want all of us
to avoid from now on.


For the GLRC, I’m Shawn Allee.

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Return of the Bedbugs

An old insect pest is becoming a problem again because of new approaches to pest management. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:

Transcript

An old insect pest is becoming a problem again because of new approaches to pest
management.
The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:


You’ve probably heard this little bedtime gem… “Good night. Sleep tight. Don’t
let the bedbugs bite.” But, most of us have never even seen a bedbug. That might be
changing.
The bedbug is making a comeback.


Because of consumer’s health concerns, pest control
companies no
longer use insecticides that wipe out everything. That means some bugs are spared.
Cindy
Mannes is with the National Pest Management Association.


“So as a result, there might be other pests that may have been controlled 20 years
ago with a more
broad spectrum-type product that would have eliminated lots of other insect species.”


Bedbugs don’t spread diseases, but the little insect does bite, feeding on the
blood of its host.
Mannes says it only comes out at night and can hide anywhere dark, under cushions,
behind
pictures on the wall or under your covers.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Lester Graham.

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Asian Beetle Invasion Spreads

The infestation of Asian long-horned beetles is spreading in North America. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Karen Kelly reports:

Transcript

The infestation of Asian long-horned beetles is spreading in North America. The Great Lakes
Radio Consortium’s Karen Kelly reports:


An Asian long-horned beetle, about two inches long and black with white spots was found in an
industrial park outside of Toronto.


It arrived in packing material from Asia. And it burrowed into nearby trees – making this the first
infestation in Canada.


Forestry specialist Gordon Henry says the beetle poses a serious threat to Canada’s native
hardwoods.


“If it was to get into wild areas and attack maple trees, it would impact probably on tourism, it
would certainly pose a problem for anybody producing maple syrup, would also be a nuisance
pest for any homeowner who’s trying to grow one of the host trees.”


The beetle has also infested trees in Chicago, New York City and New Jersey.


Henry says it takes years to fully eradicate them.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Karen Kelly.

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States Say Feds Falling Short on Invasives

State officials say the federal government is failing to do enough to stop invasive species of plants and animals from damaging the environment and the economy. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:

Transcript

State officials say the federal government is failing to do enough to stop invasive species of plants
and animals from damaging the environment and the economy. The Great Lakes Radio
Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:


The investigative arm of Congress, the General Accounting Office, surveyed state officials about
invasive species, the non-native plants and animals that sometimes stow away in shipments to the
U.S.


Many of the pests get loose in the wild and do a lot of damage, such as the zebra mussels that are
harming the ecosystems of lakes and rivers and emerald ash borers that are killing ash trees.


State officials say there are gaps in federal legislation, leaving no money or no requirements to
control the invasive species that have been here for a long time. State officials also say that
international trade agreements can make it difficult to regulate products that might harbor
invasive species because the trade agreements don’t address the problem.


The end result is often cheap imported goods that don’t consider or factor in the cost of the pest
that can be brought in with the cheap goods. Some state officials also noted that it would be more
effective to prevent the species from getting here in the first place instead of fighting them later.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Lester Graham.

City Passes Controversial Pesticide Law

At least one city in the region has passed a controversial law that would ban or severely restrict the use of pesticides. Environmental activists are calling the move a great victory. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Dan Karpenchuk reports:

Transcript

At least one city in the Great Lakes region has passed a
controversial law that would ban or severely restrict the use of pesticides.
Environmental activists are calling the move a great victory. The Great
Lakes Radio Consortium’s Dan Karpenchuk reports:


For years, environmentalists have warned of the dangers associated with the overuse of
pesticides and herbicides, claiming that those chemicals are poisoning the land and
waters.


Now Toronto’s city council has passed a bylaw aimed at reducing pesticide use.


Katrina Miller of the Toronto Environmental Alliance says it’s an amazing win.


“We have a bylaw that’s going to protect children, it’s going to protect the environment.
We saw a city council that has decided to listen to the citizens of Toronto and the doctors
and nurses instead of falling under pressure from the industry lobby.”


The debate leading up to the vote was bitter and emotionally charged. One
representative of a lawn care company was ejected.


Lorne Hepworth is a spokesman for the pesticide manufacturers. He says the ones to
suffer from the new bylaw will be homeowners.


“At the end of the day what this amounts to is a deterioration in their property values,
you know, score one for bugs and dandelions and zero for the property owner.”


Under the bylaw anyone wanting to use pesticides will have to make a case to an advisory
board. It will be made up of representatives from the city, environmental groups and
lawn care companies.


The new bylaw will not be enforced until 2006.


For The Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Dan Karpenchuk.

Region Battles Emerald Ash Borer

An insect called the Emerald Ash Borer has already destroyed thousands of ash trees in Ontario and Michigan…and in February, it was discovered invading the northwest corner of Ohio. Agriculture officials there are trying to contain the bug before it spreads to still more states. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Bill Cohen reports:

Transcript

An insect called the Emerald Ash Borer has already destroyed thousands of ash trees in Ontario
and Michigan…and in February, it was discovered invading the northwest corner of Ohio.
Agriculture officials there are trying to contain the bug before it spreads to still more states.
The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Bill Cohen reports:


At stake across the Great Lakes region: millions of dollars of wood that’s used for furniture,
cabinets, flooring, and baseball bats. That’s why Ohio agriculture officials have quarantined an
area around Toledo, banning residents from transporting ash wood out of the area. They’ve also
sprayed pesticide on nearby un-infected trees and taken even more drastic action among the 4,000
trees the beetles had already struck.


David Shlike works for the Ohio Agriculture Department.


“At ground zero, out a quarter of a mile, we cut everything, took it down. And had to chip it. We
hauled these chips to Michigan, and they were incinerated. It’s just a devastating pest and that
pest is going to be hatching out here anytime now between the 1st of May and the 15th of May,
and we were trying to take away its food source.”


It will be a few more months before it’s clear whether or not Ohio’s action has stopped the bugs’
advance.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Bill Cohen in Columbus.

Apple Growers Trim Pesticides From the Farm

  • Bill Erwin and a number of other Michigan apple growers are involved in a huge project to reduce pesticide use in orchards. Erwin says he's among those who will continue the practice.

No one likes the idea of pesticides in baby food. But nobody likes the idea of a worm in an apple either. So apple growers have been involved in a three year project to reduce pesticides, but still turn out a crop that’s not plagued by insects. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:

Transcript

No one likes the idea of pesticides in baby food. But nobody likes the idea of a worm in
an apple either. Apple growers have been involved in a three year project to reduce
pesticides, but still turn out a crop that’s not plagued by insects. The Great Lakes Radio
Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:


Gerber makes baby food. A lot of those little jars of fruit use apples in the mix. A few
years ago the Consumers Union, an arm of the magazine Consumer reports, called for the
end of the use of many of the pesticides that end up in children’s food. And the
Environmental Working Group issued a scathing report on pesticides in kid’s food. Like
other baby food makers, Gerber knew it had to do something. It started with improving
methods to wash off or peel off pesticide residue on apples. But, there was only so much
that could be done in the plant.


Todd DeKryger is with Gerber Baby Foods. He says Gerber’s plants did what they could
to get rid of pesticide residue, but it wasn’t enough.


“Our customers were telling us, ‘We don’t want residues in the products we buy from
Gerbers.’ We turn around and tell our growers ‘We need a product without pesticide
residues.’ And it’s really been amazing how they have really bought into that whole idea
of providing a product. You know, and they say ‘Hey, look. We fed our kids Gerber and,
uh, yeah, okay, this makes sense. Now, how can I help?'”


Gerber got some help from a firm based in North Carolina. The Center for Agricultural
Partnerships contacted Gerber at its main plant in Michigan as well as Michigan State
University’s Extension Service and apple growers. They had money to pay for
publications and free consultants for three years for growers who wanted to try a way to
control bugs in the orchards called ‘Integrated Pest Management’ or IPM.


Larry Elworth is with the Center. He says IPM. has worked for other types of fruit
growers, but expertise was needed for the particular climates and growing conditions in
Michigan’s apple orchards to make IPM effective.


“It’s become a way of managing pests that gives growers way more information to use so
they can actually outsmart the insects rather than always relying on a chemical as the way
to control them.”


(apple picking sound)


That all sounded good, but no one had tried it in the apple orchards on a large scale.


“Well, our main concern was whether it was going to work or not.”


Bill Erwin operates Erwin Orchards and Cider Mill.


(sound of rolling apples)


Apple pickers are plucking fruit and gently rolling the apples into a big wooden crate for
shipping to retailers. Erwin says it seemed risky to change farming methods in the
orchards.


“We’ve been used to the chemistries. We’ve been used to the program and, uh, we
weren’t sure that using lighter chemistries was going to work and we weren’t sure that we
were going to be able to control the bugs.”


Erwin says pesticides are reliable. They kill bugs. The fruit looks good. And the orchard
is nice looking in that there’s no wildlife, bugs, birds or otherwise in the area for very
long. But Erwin says all the beneficial insects, such as ladybugs and spiders that eat bugs
that ruin fruit were also gone. Erwin says he noticed something else that bothered him –
humming bird nests – but no baby humming birds.


So, Erwin and a lot of other Michigan apple growers gave Integrated Pest Management a
shot. Erwin says they found using tactics such as mating disruption of pests works. The
worm in the apple is actually the coddling moth’s larvae which burrow into the fruit.
Apple growers used the female coddling moth’s pheremones against the insect. By
saturating the orchard with pheremones, males didn’t know which way to turn to find a
mate. No mate, no eggs. No eggs, no worm in the apple. And Erwin says he noticed
something else.


“Now we find humming birds. We find little baby humming bird nests everywhere in this
orchard. We see bluebirds out here. You never used to see those. And, so, we know we’re
doing something good with the environment and that makes us feel good about this
program. They’ve taught us something and it’s gonna be something we’re going to keep
going with.”


And it appears the results are good.


The Center for Agricultural Partnership’s Larry Elworth says the three year project was a
success.


“Growers had at least as good if not better quality apple crops than they had before. Fewer bites
from insects chewing on the surface. A lot fewer worms that had burrowed inside the
apples which gave them a higher quality crop and they actually got more revenue for
their crop than they’d been getting before. And they were also able to reduce their overall
costs for controlling insects.”


Gerber Baby Foods is relieved. By getting orchards closer to its plant to reduce pesticide
use, it’s ensured a local supply of apples. Otherwise, it meant trucking in fruit from
farther away and paying more for fruit that met consumers’ demands for pesticide free
baby food.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Lester Graham.