QuestionWe lose a lot of pine trees to bark beetles here in Houston, Texas. I stubbornly planted 10 loblollies on my property and they are about 30 feet tall now and beautiful. If I use a systemic insecticide (imidacloprid 14% - no more than 1 x year per instructions) will this do a good job in protecting them? I try to keep them stress-free but it is hot and dry here so I want to do whatever I can.
AnswerI would spray the trunks with an insecticide called Onyx. This will give about 4-6 months protection (prevention) from bark beetles. If you are talking about soil applied systemic this will not work on bark beetles. The best thing is to keep them stress free and healthy. You can check with the Texas Forest Service and see if there are any population buildup of bark beetles in the Houston area. If so you may want to spray again in 3 months. When you spray the trunks reach as high up the tree as you can and wet the trunk bark to a point of runoff. One bark beetle (black turpentine beetle attacks the lower 12-16 feet of the trunk but is slow in killing a pine). Southern pine beetles and Ips attack about half way up the trunk and will kill a pine fairly fast depending on the temperature. The Onyx will prevent attack.
