Washington scientists were surprised to find the tree-killing bugs north of Pierce County.
JOINT BASE LEWIS-MCCHORD, Wash. — A state’s insect expert called the discovery of a tree-killing bark beetle in a Bothell trap “concerning.”
Washington state officials have been tracking the migration of the California fivespined ips from Oregon since the flying insect appeared in the Columbia River Gorge in 1999.
In 2022, U.S. Forest Service Entomologist Beth Willhite identified the beetles in Ponderosa pines on Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Pierce County.
That was as far north as the state thought the insect had migrated, but then reports of pine deaths in
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