Ohio just put all 88 counties under lanternfly quarantine

Pest pressure ran the week. Ohio locked down its entire state for spotted lanternfly, Washington confirmed emerald ash borer for the first time, and Minnesota is now tracking EAB in about 60 counties. Plenty of removal work in that, and plenty of paperwork if you move nursery stock.

The big one

The Ohio Department of Agriculture expanded its spotted lanternfly quarantine from 18 counties in 2025 to all 88 counties for 2026 (Fox 8 Cleveland). If you haul trees or nursery stock out of Ohio now, it does not matter which county you started in. You need a compliance agreement, a permit, or an inspection certificate to move product across the state line.

That is the part that lands on tree crews and nurseries. A statewide quarantine means the checklist follows you everywhere in Ohio, not just the hot spots. ODA is putting some money behind the effort too, with grants up to $15,000 for state and local agencies, park systems and nonprofits to manage lanternfly and its favorite host, tree of heaven. Applications close September 30, 2026.

If you run vehicles or wood out of Ohio, sort your compliance agreement before your next job crosses a line. The alternative is an inspection you did not schedule and a load you cannot move.

The canopy

Miami revisits its tree ordinance while appeals stack up

The Miami City Commission is set to hear four tree appeals, two of them from Coconut Grove residents who already got removal permits overturned by the city's Historic and Environmental Preservation Board earlier this year (WLRN). A committee that started meeting in July is writing recommendations to change the tree ordinance by next spring. Anyone pulling removal permits in Miami should watch what comes out of that group, because it will reset how permits, protections and hazard calls get handled.

Mount Jackson, Virginia writes its first tree ordinance

The Mount Jackson Town Council unanimously adopted a tree care ordinance as the town chases a Tree City USA designation (DNROnline reprint). It sets up a 4 to 6 member Tree Advisory Board, standards for planting and removal on town property, and fines up to $500 for violations. The town can also order treatment or removal of hazard trees on private property. The Arbor Day celebration is planned for April 2027.

Two more roll-ups in landscaping-plus-tree

Seacoast Capital put a recapitalization into NE Landscape Holding, the Boston company that owns Lynch Landscape & Tree Service of Sudbury, Massachusetts (PE Professional). The deal used subordinated debt and preferred equity to shore up the balance sheet and buy back shareholder equity. Anvil Capital, which formed the holding company in 2019, still controls it. Out in Illinois, Beary Landscaping detailed its 2025 buys of MJS Landscaping in Waukesha, Wisconsin and Seasonal Solutions KC in Overland Park, Kansas, folding tree and arbor care into a bigger Midwest footprint (Cincinnati.com). The pattern holds. Tree work keeps getting absorbed into landscape holding companies.

A gear roundup worth a scroll

The Arborist Store put up a news page pulling together recent climbing and rigging releases (The Arborist Store). On the list: the Notch Jet Step II foot ascender, the upgraded Petzl PANTIN CLICK for SRT, the ISC REFLEX mechanical hitch, the Notch Six Pack rigging kit, and Buckingham's new Throttle climbing tool. Nothing here reinvents the harness, but if you are due to replace a foot ascender it is a decent shopping list.

Pest and disease watch

Washington confirmed emerald ash borer for the first time near Vancouver after two residents pulled a metallic green beetle off their windshield in early August. Federal testing verified it as EAB on August 19 (KING 5). The state started a firewood quarantine on August 18. EAB has killed more than 100 million ash nationally and runs 90 to 100 percent mortality of municipal ash within 10 to 12 years. Injections can save individual trees for a few hundred dollars each, but nobody has ever eradicated it once it settles in.

Minnesota now tracks EAB in about 60 counties, with state entomologist Angie Ambourn reporting accelerating spread and noticeable tree deaths in the north and northwest (KRWC Radio). Sioux Falls, which found EAB in 2018 and has since pulled every ash from its parks, planted 1,200 street trees this spring and starts another 1,600 on September 21, with 2,200 more planned for 2027 (KWSN). If you work ash country, the standing dead ones only get more brittle and more expensive to take down the longer they wait.

Michigan added two counties to its spotted lanternfly map, confirming populations in Berrien and Washtenaw (MDARD). That brings the state to eight counties. The Berrien find sits near rail infrastructure in West Michigan grape country, though inspectors have not turned up egg masses or infected vines yet. MDARD's rule is simple: in counties with known populations, squish and move on; elsewhere, photograph, log the date and location, report through Eyes in the Field, then kill it.

Species spotlight

Noble fir (Abies procera) grows big in the Cascades and Coast Range of Washington and Oregon, running into northwestern California, and it will hit 100 to 200 feet at a moderate pace. The wood is lightweight and straight-grained but relatively weak, so it goes to lumber and pulp rather than anything that has to carry a load. Keep that in mind on a rig. Straight grain is easy to read, but the weakness means it is not the anchor you want to trust with heavy pieces.

It likes moist, deep, acidic, well-drained soil and prunes best from late winter into early spring. Watch for balsam woolly adelgid, fir engraver beetles, root rot and western spruce budworm. The strong branch structure and excellent needle retention are why it is one of the top Christmas tree species, which is where most people meet it up close.

One for the lunch break

A large American elm on the north side of Dupont Circle in Washington, D.C. took a lightning strike in a recent storm and came down, leaving a roughly 15-foot stump. Then the notes started (WTOP). Crowds gathered to leave handwritten messages, including one that read "I'll miss you, tree," turning the stump into an impromptu memorial. The Washington Post picked up the wider scene of a fallen trunk covered in thank-you notes (Washington Post). You spend your week taking trees down. Nice reminder that the people watching from the sidewalk are more attached than they let on.

Rougher goodbye in Pittsburgh, where a badly rotted oak collapsed on Pennsylvania Avenue in Manchester, crushing parked cars, taking down a utility pole and live lines, and releasing swarms of bees from the decayed trunk onto the crews working the cleanup (Hoodline). Rot, live wires and bees on one job. Somebody earned their pay that day.

Stay safe out there,

The TreeNerd crew

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