They first showed up in the northeast U.S. years ago, and it seems spotted lanternflies have made themselves right at home, with populations growing in our region.
James McGlone, associate director of the Northern Virginia Soil and Water Conservation District and who’s retired from the Virginia Department of Forestry, told WTOP that the spotted lanternflies are “essentially a big aphid and what they feed on is tree sap.”
Spotted lanternflies’ preferred food is the sap from the Tree of Heaven plant, which, like the lanternfly, is an invasive species.
McGlone told WTOP that spotted lanternflies aren’t terribly picky, they’ll seek out the sap, or photosynthate, from any plant.
“It’s pretty much the same from plant to plant,” he said.
As an invasive species, the spotted lanternfly didn’t encounter too many predators in the United States at first.
However, McGlone said, the Chinese praying mantis, another invasive species, has been in the United States since the end of the 19th century, and has taken a small bite out of the lanternfly population. Native wild birds are also discovering that “we can eat these things,” McGlone said.
McGlone said he’s also hearing from “former colleagues in the Winchester area, and they say the populations are really falling there, and I think that’s because we’re starting to see a lot of natural predation on them.”
Humans have been doing what they can to eradicate spotted lanternflies. Killing them by squishing them, and destroying their egg masses — which look like a sort of putty on the side of trees or outdoor furniture or buildings — is still very effective, McGlone said.
However, he said, for many people, there’s an “ick factor.” McGlone described videos where entire trees were covered with adult lanternflies “and the bark is moving, and that’s really creepy.”
There have been efforts to come up with a way to kill the invasive insects chemically without posing a hazard to other animals and pollinators, McGlone said.
The Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services has tried injecting the Trees of Heaven with insecticide, which “dosed the spotted lanternfly when they fed on the Tree of Heaven, so that is probably the most directed way to attack these things,” he said.
For state agriculture, the big concern is the possible impact on fruit — in particular grapes and stone fruits, McGlone said.
“They seem to really like those plants, and what they can do is take an acre of wine grapes and turn them into an acre of jam grapes, which of course, are much less valuable than wine grapes, so they are significant agricultural pest,” McGlone said.
Fairfax County has more information on spotted lanternflies. The Maryland’s Department of Agriculture has additional information here.
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