Pat yourself on the back, New York City! Operation Squish was a success.
There were significantly fewer spotted lanternflies feasting on vegetation across the city this summer, and entomologists credited human intervention — stamping out the tree-killers on sight — with contributing to the drop.
“I have to think we are making an impact,” said Brian Eshenaur, senior extension associate for NYS Integrated Pest Management at Cornell University.
Lanternflies first arrived in NYC in 2020 from southeast Asia, and over the last two years, Gotham bug hunters have become adept at identifying — and eliminating them, Eshenaur said.
And that’s been a critical turning point in culling their numbers, since each female can lay 30 to 40 eggs at a time, as many as three times in the summer and fall, he noted. “So, we’re likely reducing the population,” he said.
Still, “other factors are certainly at work,” said Eshenaur, noting “the probable increase in natural predators,” like spiders, birds, and praying mantises, who’ve “identified spotted lanternflies as a new food source.”
Kelli Hoover, professor of entomology at Penn State, noted lanternflies are also being gobbled up by certain types of wasps as well as wheel bugs. “In nature, nothing gets ignored,” she said.
“I think that everything humans have been doing [to help eradicate lanternflies] is important, because there is no silver bullet,” Hoover added.
The Tree of Heaven, their preferred dinner, “might become weakened after successive years of feeding,” Eshenaur said, thus “reducing its nutritional value for the spotted lanternflies.” They’re also partial to maple, black walnut, willow, and river birch trees.
“They are still present and can be found on their favorite host plants . . . throughout the city,” he said. “But they are not at the same levels, so the average pedestrian will not interact with them to the degree they did for the last couple of years.”
Hoover said there’s no real way of taking an actual lanternfly census, so scientists have instead relied on observational data to keep track of their numbers.
In 2019, they caused $550 million in damages to crops and plants in Pennsylvania alone, according to Nature.
The invasive bugs use their proboscis to drill into trees and plants to feed on their sap, weakening them.
The lanternflies also excrete a sticky, sugary substance called honeydew that can attract other insects and cause mold to grow on the plants and trees they target.
As they move east, the lanternflies pose a very real threat to the wineries on Suffolk County’s North and South Forks, experts have warned.
“Just keep up the good work, New York,” Hoover said.
