Control and Management

Management tools are critically-needed to help suppress populations, contain infestations, and protect ash trees from EAB.   Research is being conducted to evaluate the use of insecticides to reduce EAB populations and protect high-value urban and shade trees.  Explorations were conducted in Michigan and China for natural enemies and pathogens that may have potential for biological control. Laboratory and field studies are being conducted to evaluate the efficacy and specificity of Chinese parasitoids against EAB.  Biological control and control with pathogens or microbial insecticides may have potential for suppressing populations of EABin woodlots and natural areas.  Regulatory control treatments including chipping, debarking, heat, vacuum, or microwave treatment, and firewood handling recommendations are also being evaluated.  Research is also underway to understand resistance mechanisms of Asian ash species and develop hybrids to introgress resistance from Asian species into North America ash species.

Selected Research Studies

• Ash seed collection
• Bark applied chemicals to control EAB
• Black ash submergence
• Biological Control - Natural enemies
• Chipping and heat treatment to control emerald ash borer
• Cold hardiness of emerald ash borer and its biological control agents
• Colonization of ash stumps
• Debarking high-value logs
• EAB resistant ash
• Evaluation of systemic insecticides to control emerald ash borer
• Lingering ash
• Novel ash hybrids
• Overcoming obstacles to interspecies hybridization of ash
• Regulatory treatment of firewood
• Survival in firewood