quarantine Archives | Be a Smart Ash

Boulder Creek, EAB, infested, ash tree, emerald ash borer

172 EAB-infested ash trees to be removed along Boulder Creek

July 24, 2018

BOULDER, Colo. — One of the most iconic paths in Boulder, Colo. is about to lose one of its greatest features: a vast amount of the trees that shade it from the summer sun.

The City of Boulder Forestry Division announced in June that it would be removing 172 trees along the Boulder Creek Path beginning June 18 and continuing through September. The trees slated to be removed are ash trees that are either dead or dying after having been infested by emerald ash borer (EAB), the most destructive forest pest in U.S. history.

The majority of the ash trees scheduled to be removed along the Boulder Creek Path are under seven inches in diameter, and are located between the 9th and 30th streets. The path itself is about five miles long, and the area where the trees will be removed represents nearly a two-mile stretch of it.

The primary reason for the tree removal, according to the City of Boulder Forestry Division, is to mitigate safety issues caused by the potential for falling limbs from dead and dying ash trees affected by EAB. This move comes just a year after 121 trees were removed from the University of Colorado campus in Boulder for the same reason.

Emerald ash borer discovered in Lafayette, Colorado

August 9, 2017

LAFAYETTE, Colo. — Emerald ash borer (EAB) has been discovered in Lafayette, the Colorado State Forest Service (CSFS) confirmed on Wednesday. Lafayette is now the third city in Colorado facing an EAB infestation.

Not entirely unlike the mountain pine beetle, which decimated pine trees across hundreds of thousands of acres in Colorado’s high country beginning in 2008, EAB has decimated ash tree populations in more than 25 states and parts of Canada, causing billions of dollars in damage over the last 15 years.

CSFS community forestry program manager Keith Wood also confirmed Wednesday the newly found infestation in Lafayette remains within Colorado’s EAB quarantine zone. That zone includes Boulder, where EAB was discovered in 2013, and Longmont, where EAB was discovered in 2016. Lafayette is less than 13 miles from each city.

“Having a new detection in this area was not unexpected,” Wood said. “But it certainly highlights the need for Front Range communities to be planning now, before EAB arrives.”