The agency is currently testing various potential pesticides in a lab at the plant quarantine branch. “They don’t want to be known as the cause of spreading this around.” Hawaiian Earth Products has three or four other sites on the island, so it is only partially shut down, he explained, and the company is expecting the Department of Agriculture to come up with a pesticide treatment that can be used to kill the beetles. ![]() “They’ve been very cooperative,” said Curtiss. But after the company was approached by officials from the Department of Agriculture, Hawaiian Earth Products voluntarily agreed to stop transporting mulch in or out of the area and to stop selling mulch that was bagged in the area, as well, according to Curtiss. This finding was particularly unfortunate as the beetles like to breed in mulch. Previously the quarantine zone was confined to the military base, which is working with the state in the eradication effort. On July 7, the field crew brought bad news: one of the beetles was found in a trap outside the quarantine zone, on private land belonging to Hawaiian Earth Products, a company that makes mulch sold throughout the state. The 32 field staffers were hired temporarily to track and trap the beetles, and 16 trucks were leased to ferry the workers around the island. Since the beetle was discovered, incident command staff have been working 6 days a week, 14 hours a day to combat the pest, according to Rob Curtiss, the acting manager of the Hawaii Department of Agriculture’s plant pest control branch and one of two incident commanders on the project. The state of Hawaii pledged additional funding. Federal authorities threw $2.4 million in farm bill money at the effort. and was already on a federal quarantine list, an emergency response program kicked in. Given that the beetle had never before been seen in the U.S. 23 at the Mamala Bay Golf Course of the Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, Honolulu’s Navy-Marine military base. The rhino beetles were first discovered in Hawaii on Dec. In Japan, the beetles are kept as pets, set against one another in beetle wrestling tournaments that are gambled upon, according to one Hawaii Department of Agriculture official. The beetles’ larvae are even larger than the beetles themselves, ghostly white and covered in deep ridges with featureless snouts. A live beetle, which can measure up to two inches long, fits neatly in the palm. ![]() Thought to have hitched a ride to Hawaii from Guam, the coconut rhinoceros beetle is often referred to simply as the rhino beetle, for the rhino-like horn on its snout. ![]() The beetle is just one of dozens of invasive species that plague the Hawaiian islands, costing the state millions of dollars in crop losses, extinction of native species, destruction of native forests and spread of disease. ![]() The giant flying beetle feasts on and kills palm plants, including the coconut palm tree, that iconic symbol of the Hawaiian landscape, and a major source of income for the Hawaiian nursery industry. They have spent all day surveying traps and have brought back their finds, three enormous shiny beetles held in clear plastic bottles.Įvery day for weeks, this field crew of 32 has reported to the conference room, which serves as the incident command center for a multi-agency effort to eradicate the coconut rhinoceros beetle from Hawaii. HONOLULU - Late in the afternoon on a Monday in July, pairs of men and women in reflective vests and hard hats, carrying binders, backpacks and long poles topped off with hooks, begin to trickle into a large conference room in the plant quarantine branch of the Hawaii Department of Agriculture.
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