Infestation threatens island’s plants
AN INSECT that targets and destroys palm trees has turned up in Cyprus, infesting plants in four major districts, the Agriculture Ministry said yesterday.
If no measures are taken to deal with the problem the island’s palm trees will die at an annual rate of five per cent, experts have warned.
The beetle, known as the Red Palm Weevil or Rhyncophorus ferrugineus, was first reported in Limassol last September. It is thought the insect was most likely imported from Egypt on already infested trees.
Two months ago the ministry launched a survey all over Cyprus consisting of trappings and visual inspections of the bug.
Speaking to the Cyprus Mail yesterday, Evanthios Kazantzis, who is co-ordinating the survey, said he hoped that by the end of the summer the ministry would have a well-rounded picture of the problem.
“It is considered the most serious enemy of the Phoenix and Washingtonian palm trees,” he said.
Kazantzis said it would take a joint effort to clampdown on the problem, including the support from private owners, municipalities and communities if they valued their green environment.
He said an integrated approach including both preventative and curative measures that involved chemical control and setting of traps, was needed.
“Community leaders need to be convinced to apply systemic pesticide by root application and stem infusions,” he said
Spraying the trunks was also another preventative measure palm tree owners were advised to take.
But Xanthi Kollitsis, whose Maroni property in the Larnaca district owns 40 palm trees, said the ministry was not being very supportive.
“We’ve been told they [dead palms] have to be buried five metres underground because they can’t be burned but that’s not very feasible because they are 10 metres high and who is going to let us go in and dig holes in their land?”
Six of Kollitsis’ trees are currently infected, two of which need to be uprooted.
Kazantzis confirmed that dead trees had to be cut at the base and buried in the ground rather than burned because of the moisture contained within the trunk which made burning difficult.
Kollitsis added: “Maroni is an agricultural area and we can’t just go into some farmer’s field and dig holes… this is not very feasible, because where are they going to bury all these [infected] palm trees.”
The 29-year-old said she believed her trees had become infected from a neighbour’s trees.
“The problem is our neighbour is refusing to do anything about it and every single one of his is completely infested. Although we’re spraying ours, even if they get cured they’ll get sick again because he won’t spray his or remove them,” she said.
A ministry source, who wished to remain unnamed, admitted Maroni was a particular problem with residents refusing to take steps to save their plants due to the cost.
According to Kollitisis she was going to have to pay around £300 per tree to have it uprooted.
“A lot of people simply can’t afford it and the government should be doing something to help because soon all the island’s palms will be infected and it’s a shame,” she said.
But the ministry source said the government simply couldn’t afford to pay for such a project. Instead private owners, municipalities and communities would have to foot the bill if they wanted to continue enjoying palm trees.
“Otherwise they’ll die and slowly be replaced with other plants,” he said.
Kazantzis said the red palm weevil affected both young and old trees. In the young trees, the adult beetle scooped the tender tissue in the trunk with its long snout and laid eggs, he said.
In older trees, the injuries on the trunk served as sites for egg laying. The developing grubs then caused much damage in the trunk as well as in the crown regions, he said.
“The problem is they are very hard to detect. From the infestation of the weevil till the identification of infection in young plants can take six months. In adult plants it can take three summers from infestation to symptoms,” he said.
Kazantzis said symptoms included falling leaves and the cocoons found in the bores in leaves.
Grubs, after hatching, enter into the trunk region, feed on the inner tissue and expel the chewed fibrous tissue along with faecal matter outside. Most of the time, a brown liquid oozes out from the infected area in the trunk.
Within weeks virtually the entire crown will be affected, which can result in the death of the tree if adequate control measures are not taken, he said.
The adult beetle was dark red in colour with a conspicuous snout at the head region and six dark spots on the thorax.
A single adult female beetle laid about 300 eggs with an incubation period of two to five days. The larval period lasts for one to three months after which they pupate in a fibrous cocoon inside the trunk and the adult beetles emerge after 14-21 days, he said.
Kazantzis said municipalities, communities and private owners were required to notify the Agriculture Department’s district agricultural offices if they identified palm trees that were affected by a plague or showed signs of the beetle’s presence.
He said severely affected or dead palm trees had to be uprooted and buried in order to prevent the adult insects from spreading.
He also said it was advisable not to prune trees in areas near outbreak as the smell of sap attracted the beetles. “Pruning is best done in winter when the plague spreads less actively,” he said.
Plant protection department official Anthemis Melifronidou Pantelidou added that a recent EU decision stipulated that a phytosantiary certificate had to accompany imported palms over 5cm in diameter from non EU countries. The decision was made following appeals from Spain, Italy and Cyprus which have reported incidences of the infestation.
Trees that moved within the bloc had to have palm passports fulfilling certain requirements, she added.
Over and above this countries that identified the presence of the beetle had to set up infected zones and buffer zones not to allow its spread. She said all member states had to start implementing this decision as soon as possible.
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