Marion acts to preserve ash trees

MARION - The city is taking its first step toward preserving ash trees in parks, awarding a nearly $12,000 contract to a company that will apply insecticide to stave off the emerald ash borer, an insect responsible for killing millions of ash trees in the nation each year.

While this species of the borer hasn't been sighted in Marion since it arrived in Iowa in 2010, city officials said they will be applying insecticide to 74 ash trees spread throughout the Marion park system in the coming days. The insecticide, which is applied at the trunk of the tree, must be reapplied every two years.

'Some of these trees I would say are 30 or 40 years old,” said Parks and Recreation Director Mike Carolan. 'They offer a lot of shade for the park area. From an aesthetic standpoint, they're beautiful and healthy, which is important if you're going to go through the cost of trying to protect these trees.”

While Carolan estimates 700 ash trees reside in Marion's parks and green space areas, 150 lie within the main park system, and 74 have been deemed 'significant” enough for treatment.

The city decided to protect ash trees that were healthy, in a good location and provided benefit to the community.

Carolan said 764 ash trees are in the city's right of way, and the city still is determining which of those trees will receive insecticide.

To fund the insecticide treatment plan, the City Council recently approved a 25-cent increase to a fee all residents must pay - the urban forest utility fee - to $2.25 a month.

The funding also will enable the city to staff its urban forestry department with more employees and replant trees.

Ash trees that are in decline or dying will be removed over the next 10 years and replaced with other tree species.

So far this year, the emerald ash borer has been spotted in 26 counties, according to the state's Department of Natural Resources - but not in Linn County or Marion.

It has been spotted elsewhere in Eastern Iowa and can travel easily over county lines.

'It's just a matter of time,” Carolan said. 'I am working under the premise that yes, we have not found it yet, but to be a little proactive, you should not wait until it's too late if you want to try to protect that ash tree, when (the infestation) is so close to us.”

The larvae of an emerald ash borer kills ash trees by feeding on the bark and disrupting the nutrient flow, leading to a tree's demise in about three years.

The emerald ash borer has been spotted in 25 states.

About 3.1 million ash trees exist within Iowa communities, said Tivon Feeley, an urban forestry coordinator with the state's Department of Natural Resources.

The state is under a continuous quarantine, so wood can't be legally transported to other states, such as Minnesota, that have had no sightings of the emerald ash borer.

Cedar Rapids adopted a similar plan to save about 1,900 of its 15,000 ash trees.