Rhynchophorus ferrigineus: the red beetle that kills our palm trees
[Gallery not found]Costa del Sol November 2008. A very sad day for our gardening team and the owners of this hundred year old Phoenix Canariensis palm tree which had been the center of attention of their garden for many years.
Although they took all measures recommended by the Junta de Andalucía to treat the palm tree as well as using biological treatments to fight against the red beetle, one morning this palm tree was found with its beautiful central leaves fallen down. Climbing up we found an putrid and very bad smelling mass full of red beetle animal in all their states of development. This was just 5 days after the last treatment.
To save the other 3 Phoenix Dactilifera palm trees the only solution was to cut the affected palm tree away immediately. After calling the town council, we realized that it would take months to have them come to remove our palm tree. The owner decided to run with the costs and hire a private company to remove the palm tree immediately.
In the last weeks many palm trees lost their battle against the red beetle. The Spanish legislation is not giving an effective solution to this huge problem yet. The waiting lists to have the private palm trees removed are way to long. Another problem is, that there is no control wether the private people make any treatments and there are no punishments if they do not get rid of the dead palm trees, the result is thousands of dead palm trees full of new red beetle populations just preparing to fly away to search another palm tree, maybe yours.
Thanks to so much ignorance and lethargy of the Spanish authorities, this little red beetle decided to invite his Asian cousin “the black beetle”. The black beetle is even more dangerous and will attack the last resting palm trees in Mediterranean Countries.
16 Responses to “Rhynchophorus ferrigineus: the red beetle that kills our palm trees”
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Wednesday, 26th November 2008 at 7:28 pm
Is it absolutely necessary to remove the tree once the top has died. Does it become a risk?
Thursday, 27th November 2008 at 7:30 pm
Dear Barbara: if the head of your palm tree has died, after some time it will fall down. It might be possible that the damage is on a lower part of the trunk. The palm tree could brake in two and fall. We had several examples in the last years, where palm trees have fallen, sometimes even damaging the house or other plants. Another problem is that if you do not remove the affected part of your palm tree, the red beetle will continue to develop inside the palm tree, even going further down the trunk and hundreds of new beetle population will grow up and then leave in search of other healthy palm trees. Of course, it is not absolutely necessary that you cut out even the roots. You can cut down the palm tree until a reasonable height and plant some covering plants around, using the remaining trunk as a support for your climbing plants. You can use some kind of ivy, for example “hiedra mineata” if the trunk is in the shadow or summer jasmine, passionflower, lonicera heckrotti or Wisteria, if the trunk is in the sun. Make sure that before planting you make a hole that’s big enough (3-4 times bigger than the pot of your new climber) and add very good soil. In Spain they sell MANTILLO which is not expensive and very good for this purpose. Jeannette de Buck. Decojardin
Sunday, 16th August 2009 at 6:05 pm
Thanks for the info Jeannette
Saturday, 5th September 2009 at 9:45 am
It is not necessary to cut infested palms. You just have to sanitized them. This operation must be obligatory. Most of the time if the operation is done in time, this will allow your palm to recover. It is extremely rare that palms are infested in the middle of the trunk with risks of falling down. Most of the time the RPW attacks palms at the basis of the leaves. The strategy to control this palm adopted by the spanish as well as the other european countries authority has been a total failure with a lo t of public money wasted with public and private patrimony destroyed. The basis of a right strategy is now well established (published in the journal Phytoma in 2008) and has been proved to be very efficient.
Regards.
Sunday, 27th September 2009 at 5:22 pm
Dear Michel: you are right, and last months we can see more and more seriously affected palm trees that has been rescued by cutting out the bad parts and simultaneously by treating the palm tree every 6 weeks with ComBio organice Beatle treatment. We are preparing a news add to explain this procedure to encourage people to not cut but to treat correctly their palm trees. We would be happy to publish your recommendations at our website.
Your garden team, Jeannette de Buck
Tuesday, 20th October 2009 at 3:39 pm
We have just had our beautiful Palm tree destroyed by the red beetle. A few days ago I commented to my wife that the tree looked great and healthy, and a couple of days later it collapsed at the base with red beetle infestation. We have spanish friends who went to our town hall and got a permit for us to get it removed, which we did. When we were cutting it up we could see the devastation that was caused by the beetle, there was lots of beetle grubs or larvae in the tree, we cut it down to the roots then dowsed the ground and tree with petrol to kill the tree and remaining larvae, which we will leave for a couple of weeks before taking the stump out of the ground.
Monday, 26th October 2009 at 12:03 am
Dear Allan, i am very sorry for your palm tree. Sometimes it happens that the red beetle attacks the palm trees somewhere at the bottom or middle of the trunk. To see this on time is very difficult! And dangerous! Imagine that palm trees falls down on top of somebody. If you have more palm trees at your garden you should treat them with the Com Bio biological Palm treatment. We saved several seriously affected palm trees with this little hungry animals. They attach the larves of the red beetle and the more of them that are in the palm tree more of them will be killed. This treatment is a little bit more expensive. But you need to do it only each 6 to 7 weeks, the beetles that fly away to another palm tree will carry the little animals around and infect other beetle populations and finally it is not dangerous for you health and your environment. I will try to find a link to make it easy for you to buy this product.
Thursday, 12th November 2009 at 4:11 pm
Hi Jeannette
We are being attacked by the red palm weevil here in the Algarve. It appears that the infestation here is much later than in Andalusia but Im sure unless we do something the end result will be the same.I would be very interested if you could let me know where to obtain Com Bio Palm treatment and how to apply.
Regards
Thursday, 10th December 2009 at 5:40 pm
We have what we loosely call Pineapple trees in our Spanish property and have just received a message to say they have been attacked by beetles and one of them has fell over. Is this the same problem you are discussing with palm trees
Saturday, 23rd January 2010 at 2:28 pm
I would be very glad if someone could tell me how to save the sick palm trees. The problem in Greece is tremendous and thousands of palms are dying because of the read beatle. Eperts here claim there is no cyre about it
. Please let as know how we can find and apply your treatment with the Com Bio treatment.
Than you very much in advance.
Friday, 12th February 2010 at 1:54 pm
Dear Nikos, in Israel, some years ago, they managed to handle this problem. They forced each owner of a palm tree to treat the tree by from the government approved companies. If all existing palm trees are treated and the infected material is correctly taken away, it is easy to save the palm trees. In Spain unfortunately is happening the same as in Greece. Private people can do what they want, nobody is controlling them. And public palm trees has to been treated by the town halls, and many of them has no money to do it properly. So if one single owner is trying to save his palm tree that is surrounded by hundreds of ill and not cared palm trees, he is really in trouble and he has to pay plenty of money on treatments until all the other palm trees will die. BUT YOU CAN SAVE YOUR PALM TREE! Good luck.
Tuesday, 4th May 2010 at 10:53 pm
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Friday, 4th June 2010 at 12:22 pm
Hello. We have a very tall palm tree on our terrace. Only 2 meters from the house!! Yesterday I found a strange dead beetle lying under the tree. I looked it up on the internet and it seems to be this “palm beetle” (pointy nose etc.). I had noted that the tree had been looking less healthy recently with quite a number of dead leaves. How do I determine if I have an infestation? How do I treat it? If it is too late….what do I do? Do I need to approach the town hall? Advice welcome.
Sunday, 20th June 2010 at 8:48 pm
You mention “Com Bio biological Palm treatment” as a potential cure for diseased palms, I have been treating my palm for some weeks with a product that I get from my local Hiper Riego, but today have found a branch snapped off sue to being eaten away at the base, where can I obtain the Com Bio? Internet search produces nothing
Russ
Saturday, 14th August 2010 at 12:23 pm
hey thank you for this wonderful article about indoor plants .
Tuesday, 17th August 2010 at 5:21 pm
Thanks you for that wonderful article. Waiting for much. ciao.