A hometown newspaper with a local office, local owners & lots of local news
A hometown newspaper with a local office, local owners & lots of local news
Cloquet takes action as ash borer spreads
Large white "X" marks and pink dots adorn five trees in a row along Eighth Street just south of Prospect Avenue, all of them mature trees that would shade the street come summer. Instead, the trees will be cut down before spring, because they show signs of infestation of the invasive emerald ash borer insect.
Pink isn't a good color for city ash trees these days. That's because Cloquet trees marked with bright pink dots (and some with large X marks) are short-timers, doomed to be cut down in response to the invasion of the emerald ash borer. Five trees in a row bear the mark on Eighth Street, and another five or six on 17th Street sport pink accents.
The list of city ash trees affected by the emerald ash borer (EAB) has grown from 20 to 32 since mid-December, when Cloquet public works director Caleb Peterson announced the city will receive a $428,000 grant for community forestry work from the Minne...
