Seeking Beetle Resistant Confers

12 years ago

My parents lost all their Black Pines to turpentine beetles. I've been hearing about the Asian Longhorn Beetle in my state. One of the potential candidates as a replacement was listed online as being vulnerable to Bark Beetles. My questions are:

1.) Is White Spruce (Picea glauca) vulnerable to Turpentine Beetles or Asian Longhorn Beetles?
2.) Are Spruce Beetles a problem in Massachusetts?
3.) Can anyone recommend any beetle resistant, salt spray tolerant, wind tolerant conifers that survive in compact clay soil or sand and are attractive?
4.) Are White Spruce an attractive or low maintenance tree?

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Comments (4)

baxswoh
12 years ago
Conifers are not on the menu of the Asian Longhorn Beetle. Maples are at the top of their list.
ken_adrian Adrian MI cold Z5
12 years ago
have you contacted your county extension office ... and discussed such with them ...

i am wondering if you are worried about something that is not that big a deal ...

how old were the black pines.... what other pertinent history ... how long did you expect them to live ... and what was wrong with them.. that the bugs attacked[ under the theory that healthy trees usually arent attacked?]??????

and finally ... are you sure they were black pines .. Pinus nigra????

ken
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edlincoln
Original Author
12 years ago
My local extension office doesn't seem to have a website anymore.

The black pines were the most common tree in the area and they were ALL killed off within a few yeas of my parents deciding it wasn't cost effective to continue spraying. They were old, but I would have thought old age would have left a few...not every individual is struck by old age at the same rate. I think they were planted around the 30s,/40s and died around the turn of the millenium.

As far as what was wrong with them, the leading theories were pollution from a nearby powerplant, turpentine beetles, fungus spread by beetles, or nematodes spread by beetles.

Everyone called them "black pines" but I'm not sure whether they were pinus nigra. Apparently "black pines" is a colloquial term that can refer to Austrian Pines (pinus nigra) or Japanese Black pines (Pinus thunbergiana), both salt tolerant trees that have been decimated by epidemics in this area. If I still had a living specimen I could tell which it was, but none are left. They were irregularly shaped trees with brown bark that looked like glued on much (big chunks that could be peeled off) and when you shook them clouds of yellow pollen came off. Dripped lots of pine pitch.

This post was edited by edlincoln on Fri, Jan 24, 14 at 14:51
thetman
12 years ago
try this site:
http://extension.umass.edu/landscape/

lots of good info and you can sign up for their newsletter which covers pests, weather etc. very helpful. I am in SE Mass, I have seen a certain type of pines ( sorry don't know the name) in the area that have all gone down hill in the last couple of years. Of course there are plenty of white pines here- you couldn't kill this if you tried, like weeds around these parts. I tried to grow a few white spruce this year. bought two of them B&B around 5ft. they both were dead by September. (planted in May). Everything else around it I planted ( Norway and free giant) are all fine though. So no sure why they died-maybe doomed from the start?