The Government is to move to a policy of containing the pest oak processionary moth within five West London boroughs where it has become established since it was first discovered in the area in 2006.
This decision follows scientific advice that it is no longer practicable to eradicate the species from the core outbreak zone. It is a forestry pest because its caterpillars severely defoliate oak trees, and a health hazard because the caterpillars have minute, toxic hairs which can cause painful skin and throat rashes and irritations in humans and animals.
The Boroughs comprising the core outbreak zone are Ealing, Brent, Hounslow, Richmond Upon Thames and Hammersmith & Fulham. From now on, any action to be taken to manage the moth’s impact in the core outbreak zone comprising the five Boroughs will be up to local authorities and tree owners. The Forestry Commission will no longer issue Statutory Notices requiring the owners of trees within the core outbreak zone to have the nests and caterpillars removed from their trees on the grounds of tree health.
The Commission will, however, monitor populations of the moth within the core outbreak zone to keep an eye on trends and to try to predict bad years when the population, which increases and reduces in cycles of several years, looks likely to reach serious levels.
The Commission will also:
* annually survey a ’buffer’ zone extending to a radius of 10 kilometres
(6 miles) outside the core zone, and will serve Statutory Notices requiring tree owners to remove any infestations found in the buffer zone;
* co-ordinate a programme to eradicate a small, isolated outbreak of the moth found in oak trees at Pangbourne, near Reading in Berkshire in 2010; and
* follow up the 2010 discovery of a nest and moulted caterpillar skins in Sheffield to check whether any caterpillars survived and bred in oak trees there.
Roddie Burgess, Head of the Forestry Commission’s Plant Health Service, said,
"We fully understand that local people and organisations will be very disappointed that we are no longer pursuing a policy of eradicating oak processionary moth from West London.
"However, Ministers have accepted scientists’ advice that it is no longer practicable to try to eradicate it from the area, and have asked us to move to a policy of containment and management.
"We and our partners in the local authorities, the health authorities, the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, the Royal Parks and other managers of large properties have been very successful over the past five years in keeping the impact of this pest to a very low level. However, our experience on the ground and the scientific advice indicate that it was going to be almost impossible to completely eradicate it.
"It is therefore clear that the wisest use of the available resources is to continue to work towards keeping it contained at the lowest practicable level within the current core outbreak area and to prevent it from spreading outwards to the rest of the country."
To help keep the pest contained within the core zone, restrictions will be imposed on the movement of oak material, such as nursery plants and tree surgeons’ prunings, out of the core outbreak zone into anywhere else in Great Britain. Further information about these restrictions is available from the Commission’s Plant Health Service on plant.health@forestry.gsi.gov.uk; tel: 0131 314 6414.
More information about oak processionary moth is available from the Forestry Commission website at www.forestry.gov.uk/pestsanddiseases.