Maryland Gypsy Moth Problems 2007 – 2008
The Garrett County Forest Conservancy District Board has been working in cooperation with the Maryland DNR Forest Service, the Maryland Department of Agriculture, the Garrett County Office of the University of Maryland Extension Service, the Garrett County Commissioners, and many private forest landowners to inform our citizens about the Gypsy Moth Problem we are experiencing.
People all over Maryland and other states nearby as well, are right now seeing an outbreak of epic proportions of Gypsy Moth. Our forests are being devastated by these pests and your help is urgently needed to obtain assistance. One of the best things everyone can do is write your elected officials and seek their help to obtain funding for spraying next spring. We need all the help we can get. Below you will find two important pieces of information that we urge you to take action on. First, just below, is information on how you can find the names and addresses as well as email addresses of your elected officials. Below that you will find additional information and a sample letter that you are free to copy (any parts/or all) and mail to your elected officials. Please help to save our forests. We strongly urge writing both your state as well as your federal officials. We have an understanding that federal monies may be severely restricted or may not be available at all for spraying gypsy moths next year. Because of this, it is especially important for you to write your federal elected officials. Only by your help and letters can this be reversed.
To find the name of your elected officials, go to the Maryland General Assembly website at: and click on "Contact or find a legislator". Click on "Find your Federal & State Elected Officials. On the Split Screen scroll down the right hand side and enter your address and City. Click on Find Elected Officials.
To contact your State Elected Officials by Postal Mail:
All Senators have the same address:
The Honorable (the first and last name of your Senator)
Miller Senate Office Building
Annapolis, MD 21401
Salutation: Dear Senator (Last name):
All State Delegates have the same address:
The Honorable (First and Last Name of your delegate)
Maryland General Assembly
House Office Building
Annapolis, MD 21401
Salutation: Dear Delegate (Last name):
To Contact your State Senator or Delegate by email:
Log on to the Maryland General Assembly Website at mlis.state.md.us and click on Contact or find a legislator. Click on Contact your legislator. There will be a drop down alphabetical listing of the members of the Maryland General Assembly. Click on the name of the person you want to email and a new message form already addressed your delegate or Senator will appear. Proceed as you would normally.
All State Senators email addresses are:
All State Delegates email addresses are:
To Contact the Governor of the State of Maryland by mail, phone, or email:
The Honorable Martin O'Malley 1-800-811-8336
Governor 410-974-5041
State of Maryland 410-974-5152 (Fax#)
State House
100 State Circle
Annapolis, Maryland21401
The Farm Bill in the U. S. Congress
It is our understanding that the Farm Bill that is in the U. S. Congress is the place where money is locatedfor all of the Federal grants to states for forestry. This includes money for the gypsy moth program but at this time, the money in the Farm Bill for gypsy moth has been cut from millions of dollars to only about $500,000 for the whole nation. U. S. Congressman Wayne T. Gilchrest from the 1st District in Maryland is on the Farm Bill committee. We urge you to write your elected officials and especially Congressman Gilchrest and ask them to vote for increasing funds in the Farm Bill for gypsy moth suppression.We understand that simply restoring more funding to USFS, or even to the Forest Health Protection program specifically, will not allow them to restore funding to gypsy moth suppression, eradication or even the gypsy moth Slow the Spread program because of the way this gypsy moth appropriation has been proposed by OMB,. What specifically needs to happen is that there needs to be "gypsy moth-specific" language in the Farm Bill. Another approach would be a “funding earmark” for gypsy moth control. We desperately need your help to write your elected officials to make this happen. The USDA Forest Service cannot provide the states money unless this happens and we need you to help make this happen.
MarylandUnited States Senators
Senator Barbara A. Mikulski Senator Benjamin L. Cardin
503 HartSenateOfficeBuilding 309 Hart Senate Office Bldg.
Washington, DC20510 Washington, DC20510
202-224-4654 202-224-4524 - FAX 202-224-1651
To send emails to Senator Mikulski, go to her To send emails to Senator Cardin, go to his Web site at Web site at:
Assistant
Julianna Albowicz
32 West Washington Street - Room 203
Hagerstown, Maryland21740
301-797-2826
MarylandUnites States Congressmen
6thDistrict Congressman 1st District Congressman
Roscoe G. Bartlett, Jr. Wayne T. Gilchrest
1 Frederick St., Suite 2 2245 RayburnHouseOfficeBuilding
Cumberland, MD 21502 Washington D. C. 21515
(301) 724-3105FAX (301) 724-3538 (202) 225 5311
2412 RayburnHouseOfficeBuilding To send emails to Congressman Gilchrest, go
Washington, DC20515 go to his web site at:
(202) 225-2721
Assistant
Brenda Frantz
1 Frederick Street - Suite 2
Cumberland, Maryland21502
301-724-3105
GARRETTCOUNTY
Forest Conservancy District Board
1728 Kings Run Road
Oakland, MD21550
301-334-3296
For Immediate Release July 10, 2007
For the second year in a row, large masses of state forests and private woodlands in GarrettCounty have been devastated by a severe outbreak of gypsy moth caterpillars. In 2006 GarrettCounty was left with over 15,000 acres severely defoliated after more than 14,000 acres had been sprayed.
The toll this year was much worse. “About 40,000 acres of trees have been stripped of leaves,” said Charles Hoffeditz, chairman of the Garrett County Forest Conservancy District Board. “This spring was extremely dry and the natural fungus that helps hold the caterpillars in check failed to appear as expected.”
Other parts of Maryland also had gypsy moth outbreaks, and wherever the insects invaded woodlands, they devoured leaves – mostly oak – and turned large tracks of forests into barren, winter-like landscapes in June. What’s worse is that the insects can be tree killers. Young, vigorous trees may be able to withstand one defoliation or sometimes two, but most trees will die after two defoliations in a row.
In GarrettCounty, dead trees will destroy some of Maryland’s most scenic and spectacular forests and negatively impact forest products and outdoor recreation industries.
“We need the public’s support to help save our forests,” Hoffeditz said, because to date, there is scant public money allocated for gypsy moth suppression efforts in 2008.
Citizens are asked to contact state and federal elected officials to request funding for gypsy moth spraying. (For detailed information, visit the forestry board’s Web site: and click on GYPSY MOTH ANNOUNCEMENTS – This will be updated as new information becomes available.)
Damage to the forest ecosystem is potentially more serious than just losing live trees in the forest, Hoffeditz, said. “There will be no sprouting from dead oak or other trees. Dead trees produce no acorns. Dead trees produce very limited wildlife habitat.”
Maryland Department of Agriculture officials sprayed insecticides on some Garrett woodlands, where gypsy moth egg masses – from last year’s onslaught – had clung to trees ready to hatch for 2007 and launch another cycle of defoliation. But due to limited public funds, only a small portion of the affected areas received aerial treatments of either Bacillus thuringiensis (B.t) or Dimilin.
Unique weather conditions this spring also diminished the effects of spraying in some areas. Caterpillars must eat tree leaves, sprayed with insecticide, in order to die. Very early spring warm periods caused some gypsy moth egg masses to hatch early on warm south and west facing hilltops. Degree days control the timing of the hatch. In colder areas on north sides of hills and bottom lands where it frosts more, the eggs could and did hatch two or more weeks later. “That’s why the county had some caterpillars waiting on the ends of the oak branches for leaves to appear,” said Marshall Stacy, chairman of the Savage River Forest Citizens’ Advisory Committee. Leaf development is more dependent on day length than temperature accumulation.
The outlook for next year is not good. Thousands of acres of the state’s Wildlands, where the state has tried to preserve big trees, have been twice defoliated. Another dry summer will stress these trees so badly that if they don’t die immediately, they will surely be finished off by native insects and diseases or gypsy moths in 2008, according to Stacy.
As to funding for gypsy moth spray programs, Robert Tichenor, Chief of Forest Pest Management for the Maryland Department of Agriculture, said, “Things do not look good for next year.” The time is now for folks to ask their elected officials to restore Gypsy Moth suppression funding in the Farm Bill and to support Forest Health Protection with additional resources, as well as the gypsy moth Slow the Spread, Suppression and Eradication Programs.
State agriculture officials are basically starting fiscal 2008 with nothing, similar to last year’s situation. However, a major effort by citizens and public officials at the 11th hour resulted in MDA’s receiving $1.2 million in federal and state monies for gypsy moth spraying.
The Garrett County Extension Office, working closely with the Garrett County Board of Commissioners, also facilitated the spraying of about 600 acres of private properties through a 50 percent cost share program this spring. Extension Educator Willie Lantz worked with county landowners, some of which organized neighborhood spraying efforts, to schedule aerial spraying.
The non-native gypsy moth is the most destructive pest of forest and shade trees in Maryland, according to Hoffeditz and other foresters. This year’s outbreak is the worst in more than a decade and a half, officials said.
(New information will be added to the Forestry Boards’ website as it becomes available.)
“Promote the stewardship, conservation, management, and wise use of Maryland’s forest resources, both urban and rural.” The GarrettCounty Board is a member of the Maryland Association of Forest Conservancy District Boards”
GARRETTCOUNTY
Forest Conservancy District Board
1728 Kings Run Road
Oakland, MD21550
301-334-3296
June 15, 2007
Friends of Maryland’s forests-
Hundreds of thousands of giant Oak trees in the mountains of GarrettCounty in Western Maryland covering thousands of acres of our forests suffered a severe outbreak of gypsy moth caterpillars that literally devastated the forests in the spring and summer of 2007. This year was the second year in a row that they were hit this hard. Furthermore, many other areas in Maryland saw a similar outbreak. Right now the leaves of these beautiful trees are again being eaten by gypsy moth caterpillars. Soon these caterpillars will go through that transformation to moths and the females will begin layingmillions of egg masses that will hatch in the spring of 2008. It is a certainty that spraying will be needed again next spring. Your help is needed once again to secure funding for spraying next spring.
This spring was extremely dry and the natural fungus that usually becomes active to help hold the caterpillars in check did not appear. The trees which were totally defoliated last year had a very difficult time re-leafing due to the very dry summer and subsequently were unable to generate and store enough reserve strength to leaf out this spring, compounding their stress. In many areas, tiny little caterpillars hatched early and were observed waiting on the ends of the branches for the leaves to begin growing so that they could begin devouring the new tender leaves. In this case, the spray was ineffective because the caterpillars must eat the leaves that have the insecticide sprayed on them in order to die. While it is a little early to tell for sure, the ice damage one year, followed by two years of gypsy moth defoliation, may well have caused death to hundreds of thousands of giant Oak trees across the mountains of Western Maryland. But if these wonderful Oaks don’t die this year from the gypsy moths, they certainly are so stressed that the native pests will come in and finish them offwithin a couple of years. And the gypsy moths will be moving on again – as gypsy’s do – to create more damage in other areas and to other trees.
Many variables are involved in the determination of how much damage the forest will sustain again next year. One of the most critical factors is the weather. It certainly was not on our side this past spring. One must also realize that the damage to the forest ecosystem is potentially much more serious than just losing the live trees that are currently standing in the forest. With the death of any significant amount of trees in the forest, the future make-up of the species of trees in that stand of forest is in serious jeopardy. There will be no sprouting from dead oak or othertrees. Dead trees produce no acorns. Dead trees produce very limited wildlife habitat.
We need your support once more to help save our forests. Please act today and take action to increase state funding for the Maryland gypsy moth suppression program.
Sincerely,
Charles N. Hoffeditz Ph. D.
Chair, Garrett County Forest Conservancy District Board
Promote the stewardship, conservation, management, and wise use of Maryland’s forest resources, both urban and rural.” The GarrettCounty Board is a member of the Maryland Association of Forest Conservancy District Boards”