I hope you don't actually have these!!!!! In the Chicago area, they are removing any mature trees they see with the holes made by these horrible pests. Whole neighborhoods are being striped of 80 yr. old trees because we are trying to eradicate these beetles. Seems like there would be a better way than to take down all of the trees.

No, I don't have them...yet. I am wanting to find out how close they are to me & Chicago is darn close. I'm in Milwaukee. A friend just clued me in on them attacking japanese maples...guess who just bought a bunch of them? How long have they been in Chicago?

I live in the far western suburb of Lisle (borders on Naperville) and we don't have them. I think they are just on the north side of Chicago right now. You should Google them and get more info.

I lived close to the neighborhood that had the worst Asian Longhorn beetle problem about seven years ago, and I was definitely in the quarantine area. They basically clear-cut blocks upon blocks, and it was awful. I wouldn't think that a Japanese maples would be their favorite host tree, unless it was a pretty mature one--I did some beetle watcher training (even saw what was believed to be the Chicago "Ground Zero" site) at the time, and it seemed they liked to bore into scrubby and mature trees a bit higher up, and the branch had to have some size to it. It wasn't hard to ID either the damage or the egg-entry and sizable exit holes of the insect. As far as I know, there haven't been any infestations in Wisconsin, though with a port like Milwaukee available, and lots of railroad lines (it's believed the beetles originally arrived in Chicago via packing crate or pallet), it's not inconceivable you could have or acquire them.

If you were to find yourself in the unfortunate position of finding one in your area, you would want to alert the USDA beetle people.

Here is a link that might be useful: a usda aphis link

Thanks everyone. I know without a ? of a doubt that if I should encounter any of these to contact the proper authorities. I have read in some research that I have done about the beetle coming into Chicago via a pallet, but that was the only info I could come up with. I couldn't find any info as to whether or not they had it contained or eradicated. It's not sounding good from what Roberta has mentioned. If I'm not mistaken, I believe they 1st detected it about 5 yrs ago. If that be the case they are doing a darn good job in containing it if it hasn't spread to Roberta's area yet. My understanding is that we will have a major crisis on our hands as quickly as they breed & their ability to travel via flight or human ignorance. Personally, I am more afraid of the latter.

I don't know how I could have missed this the 1st time I looked at DirtDiver's link...but there is map section in there that says they basically have cleared up the infestation. Wow, I guess we are in good hands folks!