HRM plants trees but warns others could come down due to invasive emerald ash borer

Below the branches or above the tree tops, Halifax’s trees stand out.

“This is the city of trees. It's beautiful,” said Kevin Osmond, the senior supervisor of Urban Forestry with the Halifax Regional Municipality.

Woven into the fabric of the city, the canopy tells a story.

Old elms rest in the older neighbourhoods. New oaks in new ones.

The Halifax Regional Municipality planted 3,100 trees this year and last.

But as more trees go into the ground, some may have to come out as ash trees in the Bedford-area face a continued threat from the emerald ash borer -- an invasive insect that kills ash trees.

According to Osmond, the beetle has infested trees across Bedford from Southgate to Sunnyside Mall.

Ash trees make up about two to three per cent of the trees in the HRM.

“Fortunately for us, with emerald ash borer, we’re not going to lose that many trees,” Osmond said.

“Unfortunately, a lot the ash in HRM are on private property. So, there are a lot of backyard ash that are going to succumb to emerald ash borer.”

Osmond said the belief is the beetle came in on the rail line.

So far, not many trees have been taken down.

“But there will be,” Osmond said.

The telltale signs of an infected tree is bark falling off and little holes in the tree.

“It usually kills a tree within two to three years,” he said.

There are some local companies that inoculate trees, but Osmond said, if the insect has already entered the tree, it’s already too late.

Aborist Brian Phalen, the co-owner of Scotia Horticulture Solutions, has been busy responding to calls from homeowners and commercial properties.

He injects an insecticide treatment called TreeAzin into ash trees — mostly as a preventative measure.

“We’re quite busy,” Phalen said. “The treatment window is basically the flight of the adult stage, so in and around Halifax, it's July 1 to Aug. 31, give or take a couple of days.”

Osmond said the HRM is building a plan to deal with ash trees.

“The ones that we take down we'll be replacing as soon as we can,” he said.

Signs of the emerald ash borer include loss of leaves, serpentine marks under the bark, exit holes, splitting bark and increased woodpecker activity.

The HRM is encouraging anyone who has an ash tree to pay close attention.

If the tree shows any symptoms, Osmond notes homeowners should call an arborist who can suggest if the tree is infested and may need to be cut down.