The Editor,
Re. “Hundreds of Tri-City residents will take aim at chafer beetles” (The Tri-City News, July 17).
It is interesting to note that nearly 750 nematode treatment permits have been issued so far to Tri-City residents. Sadly, this small number of homeowners applying beneficial organic nematodes to their lawns is a far cry from being an effective way to combat chafer beetles.
Tri-City mayors and councils should put their heads together to devise a plan to collaborate with residents to eradicate the pest.
I applaud the city of Port Moody for its foresight in approving in February a program to provide a 50% subsidy to single-family homeowners on the purchase of nematodes on a two-year trial. Cost to the city is $5,000 per year, which is a mere drop in the bucket when you consider grub damage to each city’s property is estimated at several hundred thousand dollars.
I challenge the mayors of Coquitlam, Port Coquitlam, New West, Burnaby and other municipalities to offer the same incentive to their residents next year as this is a win-win situation to fight the beetle in an environmentally friendly way.
Simply putting a ban on pesticides won’t work as long as people can buy them from stores and the ban is realistically too costly to enforce. During the past three months, I have seen people grabbing pesticides from store shelves like hot cakes although they are not guaranteed to kill the grubs.
Beetles from untreated lawns will spread to other lawns and parks in a vicious cycle and, sadly, a handful of us are fighting a losing battle.
A case in point, the beetle was first spotted in New West in 2001 and has since spread all over the Lower Mainland.
We should all make a concerted effort to combat the chafer beetles before they make our home lawns and public parks look like battlefields.
David Choo, Coquitlam
FOLLOW UP ON HOMES WITH PERMITS
The Editor,
Next spring, the cities that have issued special watering permits to those treating their lawns with nematodes must follow up on every property that received a permit to determine if the process actually reduced or stopped the chafer beetle problem.
I would suspect many homeowners are using this loophole to unnecessarily keep their lawns green during a period when sprinkling is severely restricted.
G.W. Baskett, Coquitlam
