PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) -- It's official. The emerald ash borer, a half-inch-long metallic-green beetle, has arrived in Portland.
Portland Parks and Recreation‘s Urban Forestry division recently released a plan to manage the insects, which have already been found in Washington, Yamhill, Marion and Clackamas counties.
The Oregon Department of Forestry announced that the beetle from East Asia had made its way to Portland on Tuesday morning, putting nearly 100,000 trees at risk.
Officials say it has had a "devastating" impact on trees in North America.
“The pattern of spread in the eastern U.S. has been that populations at first increase slowly and the rate of natural spread is slow,” said Cody Holthouse, Manager of the Oregon Department of Agriculture’s Insect Pest Prevention and Managemen