Beetles attacking redbays

When Charlie Alexander noticed that a favored redbay laurel adjacent to his home was dying, he surmised that the large tree might not be getting enough water.

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Redbay Laurel Wilt

Late last week came word that laurel wilt - the name given to the disease that has proved deadly to redbays in Florida, south Georgia and lower South Carolina - might have been detected on James Island. Samples taken from trees along Fort Johnson Road are being examined at laboratories. Results should be known this month, Folly Beach Mayor Carl Beckmann Jr. said.

Then while watering the tree, he noticed its roots seemed dead and thought maybe the circle of bricks he put around the redbay was to blame.

Like most Folly Beach residents, Alexander had never heard of laurel wilt or the ambrosia beetle that spreads it. Word now is spreading fast on the island, but the news is well behind the disease that threatens to take out all the island's redbays.

Redbays, evergreens that populate Folly's canopy of shade trees, are dead or dying by the scores, saddening and frustrating residents and property owners and bringing in state forestry experts who had hoped to make the island the tree disease's last stop in a six-year northward migration.

Late last week, however, came word that laurel wilt — the name given to the disease that has proven to be deadly to redbays in Florida, southern Georgia and lower South Carolina — might have been detected on James Island. Samples taken from trees along Fort Johnson Road are being examined at laboratories. Results should be known this month, Folly Beach Mayor Carl Beckmann Jr. said.

"The trees along Fort Johnson Road had the classic symptoms of laurel wilt," said Laurie Reid, entomologist with the S.C. Forestry Commission.

She said redbays die after ambrosia beetles bore into them. But it's not the beetle that kills the tree, it's a fungus attached to the insects.

Neither the ambrosia beetle nor the fungus are native to America, but came here from Asia, probably in a shipment. Laurel wilt first was found in 2002 in Savannah, from where it spread into Florida and, using the Sea Islands like steppingstones, up the Southeast coast.

With their slender, pointed leaves, redbays are evergreens. When laurel wilt strikes, redbay leaves turn brown, but they don't fall off as would leaves that lose their color in the fall.

"It's devastating to see all the dead trees," Reid said.

Looking for answers

Some residents welcomed an explanation for their trees' demise. Like Alexander, some wrestled with their own theories at first. At least one resident isn't buying the official explanation.

"I don't think it's the beetle," Charlie Johnson of East Arctic Avenue insisted. He suspects that the summer was too rainy for redbays and that homeowners inadvertently drowned them. "I think I watered them too much, and they died," he said.

Ironically, Alexander thought that when his redbays began turning brown, the issue was a lack of water. "I love them, they are nice trees," he said.

His favorite redbay, a large one near his home, had proved to be a "survivor," he said.

"It has blown down three times, and I stood it back up. And now it's finished," he lamented. He said he hopes that green sprouts around one of his brown redbays means the tree is making a comeback. So far, Folly's redbay losses are confined to the island's eastern end, particularly the 1100 block area.

Beckmann said he's waiting for the forestry commission, S.C. Department of Natural Resources and other agencies to come up with a plan for dealing with laurel wilt. A worst-case scenario, he said, is that all the island's redbays may have to be cut down and burned to destroy the beetle and its fungus. He said new redbays may take root or be brought in as seedlings, and hopefully can be repopulated.

Billy McCord, a DNR wildlife biologist, already has communicated with Beckmann about a possible redbay burn. McCord also suggested that Folly Beach County Park, which is closed for the season, might be a good burn site.

"A cleanup of infested trees on Folly may make a difference, but there are no guarantees," McCord said in a December e-mail to Beckmann. The burning "must be done this winter since the beetles will disperse in spring," he advised.

"It is pretty much certain that not doing any control will lead to much broader infestation of laurel wilt on Folly during 2009. I think burning is the best option if the material is not to be removed from the island," McCord said. "Property owners can't be expected to leave the dead trees in place, particularly since some trees, or parts thereof, could eventually fall and damage property."

'We hate losing them'

Dr. John Rhodes, a Folly Beach property owner and retired physician living in West Ashley, said he cut down several dead redbays at his beach property.

"One of the biggest was huge, the same as a large oak tree. We hate losing them," Rhodes said.

As a member of the Lowcountry Re-Leaf program, Rhodes once helped get new trees planted in the Charleston area. He said he had not been advised when he cut down his redbays to keep the remains on the island, and he let trash collectors haul it away.

Beckmann said that sending infected tree parts to the Bees Ferry landfill in West Ashley will help the disease spread.

Reid said laurel wilt already is taking out redbays in Florida, southern Georgia and lower South Carolina. Several years before being discovered at Folly, the disease hit the Sea Islands of Hunting, Edisto and Kiawah, and has been confirmed in Bamberg, Jasper, Beaufort, Hampton, Allendale, Bamberg, Colleton, Dorchester and Charleston counties.

"As time goes by, it invades the entire area," Reid said.

She said there's hope that Charleston Harbor will prove to be a natural barrier to the beetle's northward spread. Ambrosia beetles are small at just a millimeter to two in length and their spread across the Southeast is taking them about 20 miles per year.

But aided by the wind, the little beetles can overcome obstacles. In one case, they migrated three miles over open water to get inland from a Sea Island.

"It's frustrating. There's so much about this insect that we don't know," Reid said. "We don't know exactly what it's going to do."

The only good news about laurel wilt is that it's not likely to spread to oaks or pines. Ambrosia beetles crave the scent of redbays, but they will attack sassafras trees, Reid said.

For more on laurel wilt, see the U.S. Forest Service web site.

Reach Edward C. Fennell at efennell@postandcourier.com or 937-5560.