The mountain pine beetle isn’t the only insect infecting local trees — there’s an insect that takes a liking to aspen trees, too, and it can be deadly.
While the insect, known as the aspen scale, has nowhere near the far reaching devastation to aspen trees that the pine beetle has had to lodgepole pines, the tiny bug is still concerning.
Edwards resident Raymond Bleesz noticed something odd affecting the barks of the aspen trees in his yard this summer and began to research what he was looking at. The trees look sickly, he said, so he contacted the Colorado State University Extension office in Eagle.
“I’ve lived here since 1990 and I have over 40 aspens on my lot,” Bleesz said. “Over the years, I’ve never seen anything like this. It’s not pleasant to see or touch.”
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