Introduced Pests are Threatening America’s Trees… 🌳🪲

Perhaps the most concerning ecological issue facing our woodland ecosystems throughout much of the United States and North America is the repeated introduction of invasive insects, fungi, and pathogens from abroad. In this video, I share about how these introductions continue to happen, why they are so problematic, and if there is anything we can do to slow or stop them. Studies estimate that about 2.5 non-native forest insects are introduced into the US each year. The vast majority of these are due to importation of live plants and through wood packing material. To reduce our role in this issue as individuals, we can use native plants in our landscapes, purchase fewer items from overseas, educate others about these pests, track these pests using citizen science apps, and advocate for better international shipping standards. Ultimately, federal governments will have to step up and make changes to shipping standards that reduce the likelihood of importing something problematic. The Cary Institute for Ecosystem Studies created a really nice overview of changes that should be made when it comes to trade. I was going to link to a petition of theirs, but they’ve already submitted it to the previous administration. I hope we can keep the fight for smarter trade going: https://www.caryinstitute.org/science... While researching for this video, I made a table of invasive pests that are affecting trees within North America. Feel free to explore, edit, add to, or otherwise improve the table here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/... For more information including a full script, sources, and more, click here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1p... Video outline: Introduction and Overview - 0:00 - 1:20 Case Study - Chestnut Blight Fungus - 1:21 - 2:37 Other Brief Examples - 2:38 - 3:40 How does this keep happening? 3:41 - 5:52 Why are these pests so deadly? 5:53 - 8:16 What are the impacts? 8:17 - 10:15 What can we do about it? 10:16 - 12:59 Call to Action and Conclusion 13:00 - 14:32 No AI-generated content was knowingly used to make this video. Various video clips throughout were downloaded from Pixabay - a royalty-free website. I am thankful for those who choose to make their high-quality footage available for others to use! Thanks to Istiak Hasan, Kmeel_com, Naturalussvideo, RobertoSFR, Alexander Durmanenko, NickyPe, TheMarcKnight, InOldNews, Roberto Carlos Inga Noteno, Alexander Tolmachev, Joshua Woroniecki, Ruslan Sikunov, Sookkyung Han, Makar Kononchuk, Lumos Ajans, Andrea Spallanzani, Bellergy RC, Drive Multimedia, Nick Murphy, Radd, blackmarketmusic, Heath Miller, Barney Elo, Life-of-Vids, Roser Petrus Moll, Roy Buri, Stuart Moulding, Andrzej Kos, Zibik, and others for footage! Various photos under license CC0 or CC-BY were used from iNaturalist, and credit was given with the pop-up name on video. For those under the CC-BY 4.0 license, no changes were made to the original photos. Thanks to Pedro Henrique Maloso Ramos (pedro1203), Christina Butler (skitterbug), and Nick Bédard (nickbedard). Other images / photos used in this video came from WikiMedia under licences CC0 or CC-BY. For those under the CC-BY 4.0 licence, no changes were made to the original photos. Thanks to Udo Schmidt, the US Forest Service, Northern Arizona University, TedE, and Tsaneda for the useful and educational graphics! https://creativecommons.org/licenses/... Thanks to Chestnut Hill College A/V Department for letting me borrow recording equipment! Go Griffins! Follow me on TikTok and Instagram for more trees, plants and nature!   / andrew_the_arborist     / andrewthearborist   LinkTree - https://linktr.ee/AndrewConboy