The Asian Longhorned Beetles Are Back

Dunh dunh DUNH! The Parks Department has found the Asian longhorned beetle in a tree at East 70th-71st Streets and Fifth Avenue in Central Park, joining 47 other trees in the NY area. The Asian longhorned beetle is no friend of trees, their larvae will hatch and end up infesting and destroying trees. And the beetle is such a menace that the U.S. Department of Agricultural Farm Service sends people to inspect the trees. The Parks Commissioner Adrian Benepe is begging people to call 311 if they see the beetle, or else the beetles might destroy ALL THE TREES IN NEW YORK! There may have been the CBS TV movie, Locusts, but that would be nothing compared to Asian Longhorned Beetles! The Central Park tree will be "will be chopped down, chopped up, chipped up, then incinerated."

Here's the Parks Department's site about Asian longhorned beetles, complete with crazy animation. The NY Times interviewed the team of smokejumpers who have been shimmying up trees in Central Park, inspecting them for beetles (their other duties for the Department of Agriculture include fighting fires on the West Coast); best smokejumper quote: "One police officer said, 'Now you're just part of the Central Park freak show.'"