"They'll do a little bit of piercing and sucking on plant bark, but they do not pose a threat to humans or pets or anything like that," he said. Schirmer said the spotted lanternfly does not bite. "So that's what we're asking is if you see it, you squash it, you take a snapshot of it, and then you report it to us so that we can look into it and follow up on it." But yes, if we can engage the public to kill them, you know, we found the original report was a single one – and you know, that single one could be a gravid or pregnant female that could introduce an infestation to a new area, a new county, even potentially a new state," he said. "Again, we want these to be reported, and we want to know where they're being found. Schirmer also reemphasized the guidance from officials in Illinois and every other state – if you see a spotted lanternfly, stomp it. "So this offseason, we're going to try and get some information through hopefully the public reports, and see if we can figure out where it is, what the extent of the infestation is, and then maybe make our management and regulatory decisions based on that information." "We don't have a lot of resolution on where this is – is this an isolated location as we know right now – or if there are additional locations elsewhere in Cook County or even throughout the state, we just don't know right now," he said. Schirmer said it is too soon to know whether quarantines could be coming for spotted lanternflies in Illinois. This can be anything from firewood or a decorative grapevine to an RV, a barbecue grill, or a mobile fire pit, as the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture explains. Other states have set up quarantines – which forbids the moving of any spotted lanternfly egg, nymph, or adult – and regulates the movement of anything that could harbor the insect. "There's nothing that's here that keeps them in check and keeps their populations down, so without having any of those biological controls in place, they can really run rampant, build their populations up, and live in populations that are almost overwhelming in the environment." "Being a non-native species, they don't belong here," Schirmer said. The insects with their bright red underwings are visually striking at first glance. "So as a lot of these invasive species get into the United States from overseas, it gets on imports and materials and products moving into the country." The best we can say is that they came on imports and imported stone products," Scott Schirmer of the Illinois Department of Agriculture told CBS 2's Jim Williams and Marie Saavedra on Thursday. "It's hard to tell exactly how they got here. It was first spotted in southeast Pennsylvania in September 2014 and spread throughout the East Coast. The spotted lanternfly is an invasive plant hopper native to China. On Tuesday, the Illinois Department of Agriculture confirmed that the spotted lanternfly (Lycorma deliculata) has appeared for the first time in Illinois – though the department did not specify exactly where the spotting was. Invasive spotted lanternfly detected in Illinois: what it means 03:31ĬHICAGO (CBS) - A tiny pest known as the spotted lanternfly is creating a huge problem up and down the East Coast – and now it has been spotted in Illinois.
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