Environment News: Bug Catching
The General Directorate of Natural Environment and Forest Management, through the Government’s Forest Health Service, has been battling the oak weevil (Cerambyx cerdo) across the island. Traps have been installed on various public fincas and forest areas, and sanitary felling has of affected oaks has been undertaken.
Using money from the Sustainable Tourism Tax (ITS), more than six thousand traps were placed from June to August to capture adult specimens in different public estates in Mallorca, these included Binifaldó, Menut, Cúber, in the Lluc area and Gabelli Petit – home to the amazing Fonts Ses Ufanes, among other areas. In total, more than seven thousand specimens were captured.
Each trap is homemade with two containers, baited with a potent mix of wine, sugar and salt. These traps are a very effective method to control the populations of these insects and protect the island’s holm oak forests.
The density of insects has also been reduced thanks to the felling or eliminating of the trees affected by the plague. In this sense, the General Directorate of Natural Environment and Forest Management has carried out a sanitary improvement on nine hectares (ha) of the Cúber oak forest and four of the Menut oak forest.
The general director of Natural Environment and Forest Management, Anna Torres, recalls that the oak weevil (banyarriquer), a beetle from the cerambycidae family, is one of the forest pests that most affects the oak forest of Mallorca. “This insect produces internal galleries in the wood and is a transmitter of different species of fungi. In addition, it promotes the appearance of rot that causes branches and trunks to fall. However, it is a protected insect in Europe, despite the fact that on the island of Mallorca, due to overpopulation and the damage it causes, its capture has been authorised since 2016,” explains Torres.
For more information, visit sanitatforestal.caib.es.
