Bronze Birch Borer - Bronze Birch Borers

USDA Forest Service
Northeastern Area
Office of the Director
11 Campus Blvd., Ste 200
Newtown Square, PA 19073

Phone (610) 557-4103
TDD (610) 557-4160

S.A. Katovich1, A.S. Munson2, J. Ball3 and D. McCullough 4

1Entomologist, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, St. Paul, MN.
2Entomologist, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Ogden, UT.
3Associate Professor, Department of Horticulture, Forestry, Landscape & Parks, South Dakota 4State University, Brookings, SD.
4Associate Professor, Departments of Entomology and Forestry, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI.

The bronze birch borer (figure 1), Agrilus anxius Gory (Coleoptera: Buprestidae), is native to North America. Records from the late 1800's and early 1900's describe widespread damage to ornamental birches, especially in the Northeastern United States and Canada. In the 1920's and 1930's, the bronze birch borer was widely reported to be associated with dying birch trees in forests and woodlands. Today, this borer often contributes to mortality of woodland birch during severe drought or other stress. It is also an important pest of landscape birches (figure 2).

The bronze birch borer occurs throughout the range of birches in Canada from Newfoundland to British Columbia but is most common in the southern portion of the provinces. In the United States, it is distributed from Maine, across the Great Lakes region to the Cascade Mountains of Oregon and Washington, and from Maryland to Utah.