Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, March 19, 1990 TAG: 9003222449
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B1 EDITION: EVENING
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
People sent out by federal, state and county field commanders will fight the gypsy moths with a virus and with a bacteria that paralyzes the stomachs of the voracious, leaf-eating insects.
They'll use planes to spray highly infested areas with a chemical that kills gypsy moth caterpillars by preventing them from forming a new, outer skin as they grow.
They'll drop thousands and thousands of sterile gypsy moth eggs that will hatch and infiltrate the wild populations to create a breed of insects unable to breed.
And they'll even meddle in their sex lives.
Foresters will release a synthetic version of a moth secretion - pheromone - that males use to locate the females for mating. The synthetic version will produce the same scent as a female and make it difficult for a male in his search for companionship.
Virginia governments have fought the gypsy moths in previous years, but never with such a comprehensive battle plan.
Last year, 13,500 acres of state and private lands were sprayed with pesticides to kill gypsy moths.
This year, the target areas include 88,800 acres on state and private lands, 8,121 acres in the George Washington National Forest, 1,870 acres along the Blue Ridge Parkway and 1,670 acres in the Shenandoah National Park.
And the "low-level intervention tactics" methods of control, the dropping of sterile eggs and dispersal of synthetic pheromone in flake form, are being used on a widespread basis for the first time after successful pilot projects, said Gary McAninch of the state Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services.
"The insect is expanding its range in Virginia," McAninch said Wednesday. "All across the north and northwest, the moth is building up its population."
The 10 counties where the spraying will occur are Albemarle, Augusta, Greene, Madison, Nelson, Page, Rappahannock, Rockbridge, Rockingham and Shenandoah.
The agencies monitored eight other counties for gypsy moth infestation and determined the populations were not large enough to warrant spraying: Alleghany, Amherst, Bath, Bedford, Botetourt, Craig, Highland and Roanoke. McAninch said it is only a matter of time before the gypsy moths migrate into those counties in large numbers.
The Appalachian Integrated Pest Management project is a cooperative effort by federal, state and county agencies to fight the gypsy moth.
In Northern and eastern Virginia, from Loudoun County to Virginia Beach, there is a separate cooperative program to suppress gypsy moth populations.
Field workers spent last summer and fall surveying and monitoring gypsy moth infestation. Counties provided feedback on the treatment areas after holding public meetings during the winter.
McAninch, a coordinator for the project in Virginia, said they completed the preliminary environmental assessment of the aerial spraying and a final map of the areas to be sprayed.
The spraying is to begin April 24 and end June 1.
The pesticide that will be used, dimillin, poses no danger to people living in the areas being sprayed, McAninch said. "The toxicity to mammals is very low. What we tell people is that obviously you don't want to stand under the spraying. But if you are accidentally sprayed, it would cause you no harm. Also, it would be better if you don't hang laundry during the spaying."
The gypsy moth eats huge quantities of leaves in the caterpillar stage, often completely stripping a tree and killing it.
McAninch said the slimy caterpillars also bug people in highly infested, wooded recreation areas by dropping out of trees onto their picnic tables and into their hair in May and June.
"The fras, or caterpillar dung, virtually rains down out of the trees in some areas," he said.
"The efforts will make life easier for people who have to live in forested residential communities with caterpillars on their trees," he said.
"We know we're not going to eradicate the insect," he said. "We can just manage it. It's going to be here for a long time and we're just going to have to learn to live with it."
by CNB