In short:
There is a national strategy in place to contain the destructive shot-hole borer after the pest was discovered in Perth.
Scientists and councils have raised concerns about the urgency of the response, two years into the eradication program.
What's next?
The Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development says the goal is to contain the borer in the metropolitan area and eliminate it.
Scientists and local councils are concerned efforts to contain the polyphagous shot-hole borer devastating Perth's tree canopy are not going far enough after it was revealed that the lab that tests monitoring traps has been on hold since mid-June.
The Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development (DPIRD), is two years into a $41 million, three-year national response to the borer in an effort to limit it to the Perth area and ultimately eradicate it before it reaches agricultural areas.
The testing lab was shut down after asbestos was found in the South Perth DPIRD laboratory and staff had to evacuate the building.
Lab to reopen within days
Mia Carbon, deputy director-general of biosecurity and sustainability at DPIRD, told Nadia Mitsopoulos on ABC Radio Perth that the lab would be up and running at the Claremont Showgrounds by the end of this week and that the department had continued its surveillance efforts in the meantime.
"There are two different types of surveillance we do. One is the surveillance in trees, looking for any signs of the borer. Then the second form, which is really sort of an ancillary form of surveillance, is looking at these sticky traps," Dr Carbon said.
"That's not as time-critical as the surveillance in trees. The sticky traps really give us another way of detecting where the bug is in the Perth metropolitan area."
Theo Evans, associate professor of applied entomology at the University of Western Australia, said cold weather slowed down the borer's activity making winter the best time to suspend testing.
Dr Evans said DPIRD was doing a "great job" with the traps but questioned whether there were more methods that it could embrace in the fight against the borer.
"In terms of stopping the pest, you can design traps that are very effective at pulling in beetles in large numbers, and that can reduce the number of beetles that successfully find new trees, but those are not yet being used in Perth," he said.
"I'd like to see a lot more research and development on testing methods that have been thought about and talked about, but never tested either here or elsewhere.
"And some things that have been tested elsewhere and shown to have some good impact, but have not been tried here."
Borers not available for research
Dr Evans said scientists were not allowed to bring borers into the lab to test potential new treatments.
"We are constrained by various rules," he said.
"If we're going to try to test some of these things, we want to do these in safe environments in the lab so that we can most accurately measure impacts of new treatments.
"But we're not allowed to move any infested material. And so if you can't do it in the field at the tree, and therefore consequently look at all the other factors that might vary, then we can't run the test."
Chainsaws the only option thus far
The primary control method the department is relying on is removing trees that are infested with the borer, with the aim of stopping the spread and, ultimately, eradicating it from the Perth metropolitan area altogether.
Dr Carbon said that DPIRD was not researching biological controls for the borer.
"What we are doing is working really closely with scientists internationally who have had this pest for some time, and who have undertaken a lot of research on potential control options," she said.
"Unfortunately, to date, whilst there have been things that have been really promising in a lab environment, none of them have proven effective in the field.
"It is certainly still the case that the only effective way of controlling this bug at the moment remains the pruning and removal of infested trees."
This approach has led to devastation in some of Perth's most popular parks, as century-old Moreton Bay figs, paperbark trees, and London planes have been felled and woodchipped.
'We're looking at the prospect of a moonscape'
Alison Xamon, Mayor of the City of Vincent, in Perth's inner-northern suburbs, said the shot-hole borer was the number one issue the council was facing.
"We need to get some monetary support from the government for our replanting efforts," Ms Xamon said.
"We're talking about having to remove sometimes 120-year-old trees.
"If you look at Hyde Park, for example, removing every single tree in the lakes, and the tree planting efforts are going to cost a fortune."
Ms Xamon said she was also frustrated to learn that research into alternative solutions to the borer appeared to be limited.
"This is an absolutely urgent matter," she said.
"If you're on your block and you're in your suburban area and you're looking at the trees around you … we're looking at the prospect of a moonscape."
Government still committed to eradication
Dr Carbon said that while biological controls were being investigated, the primary goal of the response remained containing the beetle and eradicating it before it could spread further.
"We have had some early promising results, for example, with using certain paint coverings once you've removed a limb on a really lightly infested tree, but it is very early days," she said.
"Our current focus is absolutely eradicating. Containment is obviously a very important part of eradication. You can't eradicate if the pest is continuing to spread.
"So our priorities are to contain it to the Perth metropolitan area and then eradicate it within there."
Mornings with Nadia Mitsopoulos is live on ABC Radio Perth every weekday from 8:30-11am. Tune in on 720AM, digital radio or the ABC Listen app.
