Firewood Facts for Campers
Firewood can move forest pests long distances.
- Insects and diseases can be in, on or under the bark of firewood, or even deep within the wood itself. You often cannot see if they are there.
- Hauling insect-infested firewood from home dramatically speeds up the spread of invasive insects that harm our forests.
- An invasive insect population might spread a few miles on its own in a single year.
- Moving infested wood can spread the same pest hundreds of miles in a single day.
- With global trade our forests are getting more pressure from insects and diseases inadvertently brought to North America and then moved with firewood.
What pests can be moved by firewood?
- Emerald ash borer is one of the scariest insects that can be moved with firewood. It has the potential to kill all ash in North America and has already killed millions of trees in the mid-west.
- Emerald ash borer is found in Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Virginia, Wisconsin, Missouri, Maryland and Ontario, Canada as of 2008.
- Asian Longhorned Beetle kills maples, birches, poplars, willows and many more trees. A very large infestation was found in 2008 in Worcester, MA, not far from Maine’s border.
- It is also found in New York, New Jersey and Toronto, Canada
There is a federal quarantine on all firewood
in portions of these states and
FIREWOOD CAN NOT BE TRANSPORTED ACROSS QUARANTINE LINES.
- Several other serious insects and diseases can be moved with firewood as well.
What can you do to help?
Leave Your Firewood At Home.
Buy It Where You Burn It.
Don’t Give Bugs a Free Ride!
