Oak Tree Borers Treatment DIY: 11 Secrets for Tree Longevity

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The magnificent and iconic oak tree suffers significant damage by a tiny and destructive insect pest named borer. So, if borer infestation is untreated, your beloved and beautiful oak tree can sadly die.

But don’t be afraid. Every problem has a solution!

This informative content provides guidance and steps to preserve your adorable oak tree for generations.

Protecting Your Beloved Oak Tree from the Disgusting Borers

Our guide for oak tree borers treatment DIY aims to save your loved tree’s majestic shade and beauty from being the habitat of countless creatures. Our comprehensive advice includes learning to recognize this specific condition, its symptoms, and its signs, and use techniques & insecticides.

4 effective oak tree borers treatment DIY:

Blend Neem Oil with water and apply it to the trunk.
Combine 3-5 teaspoons of soap into a gallon of water and apply it to the trunk.
Grow garlic around the oak tree.
Spray the tree with Bordeaux Mixture, or Bacillus Thuringiensis.

Identifying 3 Borers Species that Can Devast Your Oak Tree

It is relevant to know that exists several species of this kind of insect and we can mention 3 of them:

1. Flat-Headed Appletree Borers

Flat-headed appletree borers have characteristic oval body shapes and are small to relatively large beetles.

Flat-headed appletree borers show visible symptoms such as:

Tunnels under the bark of trunks and larger branches.
Damage intensifies on the sunny side and kills the young plants.
Stems and foliage begin to die from the tip of their leaves or roots.
Leaves become less dense.
The bark is cracking.

The attraction for this specie is the unhealthy trees, the young trees, and the stressed trees.

Solutions to prevent Flat-headed appletree borers infection:

Keep your oak tree healthy.
Prepare your tree with good fertilization.
Keep your tree nourished with water.
Control of moisture levels in the house will reduce the chance of infestation.

2. Twolined Chestnut Borer

The Twolined Chestnut Borer is a slender, black beetle with a bluish-to-greenish tone, a long insect with two faint yellowish stripes along its back.

This pest initially attacks during the summer displaying visible symptoms like:

You can usually see dead leaves turning a brown color.
Twolined insects make holes through the bark.
It creates a path inside, devastating the tree through the exit holes.

Since twolined chestnut borers are an invasive pest, you can prevent tree infection by applying these methods:

Pruning infested branches to control the insect population.
Cutting, limbing, and drastically removing infested branches will dry the infective agents.
Mark to identify the infested area in the tree to treat it better.
Capping the infested holes.

3. Oak Longhorn Borer

The Oak Longhorn Borer has a distinctive metallic appearance; it is a fast-moving beetle with a flat thorax and short antennae.

This pest makes curving tunnels destroying phloem and presenting these evident damages:

Bark destruction.
Wood turns into a black color.
Oval exit holes.
Accumulation of wood fibers.
Pest excretion at the base of the tree.

This beetle can cause severe damage; the clue is to treat the tree disease before the end of its lifecycle applying:

Weekly inspections.
Internal injection to cover the affected areas.
Remove the dust from the holes and fill them with a timber injection gel.
Cap the holes.

Blocking Oak Tree Borer Infestations: Prevention Is Better Than Cure!

If you love your trees and you want to have them healthy, you need to adopt a tree-lifestyle beginning with these simple and proven prevention practices:

Select the right tree and plant it in the right place. Remember, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Choose the most suitable oak tree for your zone between all oak tree species. Then all you have to do is to provide water and nutrients.
Maintenance is essential to keep your tree healthy. For that reason, pruning is a habit that you need to practice regularly. This process will provide vigor to the damaged branches and can avoid injuries to people while they are doing landscaping tasks.
Give your tree real love by providing the specific quantity of water needed, especially during periods of scarcity. Provide nutrients and soil moisture by adding mulch around the tree.
Pay attention to your trees, inspecting them regularly to see if you notice signs of infestations like holes, tiny particles of wood, frass, crown dieback, and changes in the natural color of your majestic oak tree.

Our title is more relevant than you can imagine. Therefore, we emphasize prevention because although you can save your oak tree with borers, it can take time and effort while your tree suffers.

Taking Action: Learn the 7 Most Effective Oak Tree Borers Treatment DIY

You need to invest time to protect your beautiful oak tree by applying these powerful DIY treatments:

Use a knife to expose and remove larvae or pupae beneath the bark.
Destroy the infested branches through pruning exercises. This practice cleans the affected areas. Make sure to dispose of it to avoid a re-infestation.
There is perfection in everything created in life. Nature is taking care of you to keep pests out. You only have to encourage natural predators, such as birds and parasitic wasps helping to control oak tree borer.
Microscopic worms are potential predators of borer species, too. Apply these beneficial elongated cylindrical worms parasitic to the soil around the tree during the larval borer stage to help your oak tree to reduce the bore population.
To reduce the borer population, you can try the pheromone traps to capture the insects and avoid the progress of infestation. The ideal period to install these traps is early spring, before their emergence time.
According to the borer species, carefully use a suitable insecticide against the pest. Apply the product following the product’s instructions. It is essential to know that some chemical insecticides contain permethrin or carbaryl, which are highly effective in exterminating oak tree borers. Spray directly mixed with an absorbing agent such as linea alkane. This method kills not only the active borer but the eggs as well.
The trunk or tree injection is a harsh method for severe infestations. An insecticide like imidacloprid or emamectin benzoate must be injected directly into the tree’s vascular system. This practice requires professional application using specialized equipment and expertise.

Extends Your Oak Tree Life Expectancy by Following Our Tips

Trees are noble living organisms. But sometimes, they become hosts of disgusting bugs. Borers can destroy the majesty of your oak tree. But you’ll have to fight back for your tree.

The best and most important advice in this article is to focus on the care and invest your time, paying particularly close attention to the infected signals on your beautiful oak trees more than any treatment.

Follow our oak tree borers treatment DIY. As a result, you will have your charming oak tree for generations.

Joe Marra Tree Service provides tree care services in Oak Ridge, Oakland, Wayne, West Milford, Pompton Lakes, and Ringwood, NJ.

Call us if you need our help!

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