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William Pound, Ohio Department of Agriculture; Amy K. Stone, Daniel A. Herms, David Shetlar, Kelly Harvey, |
The Ohio Department of Agriculture (ODA) administers the state Gypsy Moth Management Program for the forested areas within Ohio. The primary responsibilities of this program are two-fold. First, in the Ohio counties where the pest is already established (i.e., quarantined counties), the ODA administers the Suppression Program. Through joint funding with the USDA Forest Service and the state of Ohio, this program coordinates aerial treatments of woodland areas at risk to damage from the feeding of the gypsy moth caterpillars. The objective of treatments applied through this program is to prevent defoliation of the trees. Control products utilized in the 2001 program included Bt, Dimilin, and Gypchek. Participation in the ODA Suppression program is voluntary, and interested individuals are required to complete an application by Sept. 15 of the year preceding the treatments. Currently, 42 of Ohio's 88 counties contain established gypsy moth populations and qualify for participation in the Suppression Program.
In the summer of 2000, 23,294 acres of forested private, state, and federal lands were defoliated by gypsy moth. In the fall and winter of 2000, field crews from the ODA conducted gypsy moth egg mass surveys on approximately 62,000 acres of forestland at the request of the landowners. The purpose of the survey was to estimate gypsy moth egg mass densities on a per acre basis, which is used to predict the amount of defoliation expected in 2001. Based on egg mass densities, a total of 37,662 acres in 19 counties were treated during the spring of 2001.
The second gypsy moth program coordinated through ODA is the Slow-The-Spread (STS) program. The primary objective of this program is to slow the movement of this pest across Ohio. This program relies on an extensive pheromone trapping program to detect and monitor gypsy moth populations. When populations are identified in the nonquarantined counties, these areas are potential candidates for either mating disruption treatments, control product treatments, or intensive trapping and further monitoring. The 46 Ohio counties currently not quarantined are being monitored through this program.
Ohio has participated in the STS program since 1999, along with North Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia, Kentucky, Indiana, Michigan, Illinois, and Wisconsin, and in cooperation with the USDA Forest Service. Pheromone flakes were applied aerially in 2001 on approximately 44,825 acres in Lawrence, Scioto, Ross, Pike, Clark, and Greene Counties of Ohio.
This summer, 45 seasonal employees deployed, monitored, and retrieved more than 13,277 pheromone traps for male gypsy moths. The traps were placed in all or part of 62 of the 88 counties in Ohio. The traps monitored population increases and territorial expansion of the range of the gypsy moth. Every dollar spent per year for STS activities saves four dollars in damage and management costs and reduces the spread of the gypsy moth range by 60% per year.
Public awareness, education, and information are essential components of any gypsy moth management program. This can be achieved by agencies and groups including Ohio State University Extension, the Ohio Forestry Association, Ohio Department of Natural Resources Division of Forestry, and the Ohio Department of Agriculture. These groups are working to raise the level of common knowledge of Ohio's citizens regarding the gypsy moth and the potential consequences this pest can inflict on Ohio's woodland environment.