Invasive bug threatens Idaho turf, gardens, crops

BOISE - A destructive new invasive insect has turned up in Ada and Kootenai counties, prompting warnings from the Idaho state Department of Agriculture. The Japanese beetle, a half-inch-long, shiny metallic-green bug with copper-brown wing covers, destroys trees, rose bushes, stone fruits, garden and field crops, and its larvae or grubs destroy turf by feeding on the roots of grass. The department is asking anyone who finds one of the bugs in Idaho to place the dead specimen in a baggie and mail it in to its Plant Industries Division, P.O. Box 790, Boise, Idaho, 83701, along with contact information. The department also has begun placing green and yellow traps; the traps are non-toxic, and people who see them are asked to leave them be. The beetle first was introduced to the United States in 1916 in plants imported from Japan.