Right Tree, Right Place Program

Have you noticed that many of the street trees in Aragona Village are dying? Only those streets where ash trees were planted have been affected. The Department of Public Works & Transportation (DPW&T) and the Neighborhood Design Center (NDC) have been working together, along with your HOA Board president, Donald Leak, to have these trees removed and new trees planted.

The street trees in the public right-of-way that are dying are Green Ash and Pumpkin Ash trees. Ash trees are being killed in large numbers across the country by a small Asian beetle called the Emerald Ash Borer. Introduced in 2003 to Prince George’s County, this little beetle has been responsible for the decline of millions of ash trees. The Emerald ash borer disease is classified as a “vascular disease.” The beetle, in its larval stage, gets under the bark of the tree and eats through the xylem and phloem disrupting the distribution of nutrients. This causes the tree to essentially starve to death and to die from the top down.

Though it is possible to save a tree by injecting it with a strong insecticide, this must be done while the tree still has 75% of its canopy left. (It is recommended that you look into treatment options if you have ash trees on your private property.) Since almost all the ash trees in Aragona Village have lost over 50% of their canopy, the ash trees along the road will be removed and replaced with a different species of street tree. The Maryland Department of Natural Resources (DNR) has a detailed web site on this topic (see http://www.emeraldashborer.info or http://www.mda.maryland.gov/plants-pests/Pages/eab.aspx )

There is a quarantine on transporting ash wood, sp please do not take the fire wood to the eastern shore or to any campground. This is how the disease spreads. Your trees became infested 5-7 years ago; it takes 3 years for symptoms such as splitting bark, epicormic growth, or canopy die back to manifest themselves. Ash is a hardwood and useful for building projects, for fire wood wonderful baseball bats.

The dying ash trees that will be removed are marked with white paint. New 2 inch caliper (diameter of tree trunk) trees will be planted next winter. New trees will not be planted in the exact same spot as the old trees. The new location will be marked with green paint on the curb. The schedule for this work is sometime within the next 18 months.

Questions about street trees should be directed to Tricia Valentine at the Neighborhood Design Center or to Wayne Lucas at Department of Public Works and Transportation, or to your HOA President, Donald Leak. Your management company has no jurisdiction over street trees. Ms Valentine may be reached by phone at 301-850-1462 and by e-mail at pvalentine@ndc-md.org.