Bark Lice Infestation Hits Southwest Florida Trees
Bark Lice have taken to trees in Southwest Florida, covering trunks and branches in a tight silk-like webbing. The tiny insects are very hard to see, but their silky web can cover large parts of your tree. Now before you call an exterminator, relax. It’s completely ok. This is actually a good thing.
The tree in the pictures is my tree, in my front yard at my home in Southwest Florida. I first noticed this silk like webbing over the weekend while I was walking my dog. All the neighborhood dogs hit this tree, so she does too. It’s a dog thing. The crazy part is – the webbing wasn’t on the tree on Saturday, but then on Sunday, large parts of the tree were covered in it. These bugs move fast!
Turns out, bark lice is actually a good thing.
I was pretty rattled when I saw this and my first thought was “am I going to lose this tree?” So I went inside to look this up. I came across a blog from Evan Anderson on the University of Florida website. In his article, he wrote “If you come across a tree trunk coated in silk, chances are you’re looking at the work of a bark louse.” And that this is actually a good thing.
Bark lice aren’t there to eat the tree, however, they are there to eat all the stuff on the tree. Things like lichen, moss, algae, and dead bark all fit into the meal plan of bark lice. Lichen is that greenish fungus looking stuff you’ll see on the shaded part of your tree. That stuff is pretty harmless, too, but it’s gonna get eaten up with the rest when the bark lice get to work.
Because having a tree die in your front yard can be an expensive ordeal, I wanted to make sure so I called the University of Florida to send my pictures to Evan.
Evan said “That definitely looks like bark lice to me.”
Evan Anderson is a Horticulture Agent in Walton County, Florida. So, he knows bugs. He continued, “there really aren’t any other critters I know of that would do anything similar. The insects themselves might be very hard to see, and they don’t clean up the webs after themselves. But if people see that going around, it’s nothing to worry about.” Mr. Anderson then added, “Bark aphids, on the other hand, might look similar, and can harm plants.”
So What’s The Deal With The Webbing?
According to Anderson, “Bark lice spin their webbing as protection from predators.” The bark lice travel in huge colonies and form huge webbing to keep the herd safe. They can’t do their job if they’ve got birds or bigger bugs coming after them, so the web is there to keep them from being eaten. Once they clean the tree of all the stuff they want, the colony will move on. Possibly to your neighbor’s tree, so this may be some good information to share.
Let the bark lice do their work, they’ll move on themselves. The webbing will eventually drop away, but if you want, you can spray it off with a hose once the colony clears out. Expect to see webbing like this popping up on trees across Southwest Florida, so let others know that you don’t need to call an exterminator. There’s no need to panic. But, if I had known they were coming to my neighborhood I’d have taken some “before” pictures so we can see how well they do. So, everything is fine – It was nice to have a happy ending to this story.
