What\u2019s worse than finding a lanternfly in your Big Apple? Try millions of them.<\/p>\n
The dreaded, now-annual hatch of the invasive polka-dotted pests is less than a month away \u2014\u00a0leaving New Yorkers are bracing for a Biblical-level plague of the superbugs.<\/p>\n
Hailing from China, the spotted lanternfly first surfaced in Pennsylvania in 2014. Since then, they\u2019ve spread to 21 states, including NY<\/a> in 2020 \u2014\u00a0despite city-wide directives to stamp out the scourge<\/a>.<\/p>\n Now, these winged terrors have infiltrated half of New York\u2019s 62 counties<\/a>, swarming the Empire State \u2014\u00a0from crowded Manhattan sidewalks to rural Upstate agricultural lands, where they\u2019ll indulge their appetite for plant sap.<\/p>\n Worse still, it\u2019s hard to predict how many of these harlequin shrub-suckers will invade the city and beyond this year \u2014\u00a0although sightings doubled from 5,000 to 9,500 from 2021 to 2022<\/a> with a peak in 2022-2023.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s an oddity that I think [we] kind of have to learn to live with in this city to some extent,\u201d said exterminator Gil Bloom of the pest (pictured). RJMendez \u2013 stock.adobe.com<\/p>\n \u201cLast year was a little slower than the previous year, but they\u2019re new insects in a new environment,\u201d entomologist and president of NYC extermination company Standard Pest Management Gil Bloom, told the Post. \u201cSo we really can\u2019t say with any full degree of predictability what\u2019s going to happen this year as they encounter this weather.\u201d<\/p>\n He added that for many New Yorkers, the fascination stemmed from their novelty, comparing them to an \u201calien invader.\u201d<\/p>\n Eats shoots \u2014\u00a0and never leaves<\/p>\n Hundreds of invasive spotted lanternflies on a tree in Pennsylvania. Eric Dale Creative \u2013 stock.adobe.com<\/p>\n \u201cLanternfly\u201d is actually a misnomer. They\u2019re actually plant hoppers \u2014 insects that siphon up plant juices using their long mouthparts, like a locust on a liquid diet. <\/p>\n And they\u2019re thriving.<\/p>\n These hardy bugs have flourished in the Northeast, aided by a lack of natural predators, longevity and their bountiful reproductive cycle.<\/p>\n \u201cThey come out as adults in end of July, but they really don\u2019t start mating and laying eggs until September, October,\u201d Julie Urban, an associate\u00a0research professor at Penn State\u2019s Department of Entomology, told the Post. \u201cSo that\u2019s freakishly long adult life stage for an insect.\u201d<\/p>\n In fact, a 2024 study out of NYU<\/a> found that the bugs are living up to five months longer than they did when they first arrived, borne aloft by milder urban winters and other factors.<\/p>\n This longevity gives them ample time to reproduce. Females can lay up to two clutches of 30-50 eggs<\/a>, which survive the winter and hatch as nymphs in the spring. <\/p>\n And these babies aren\u2019t picky eaters, chowing down on a \u201chundred different species of trees and plants,\u201d Urban said. <\/p>\n \u201cThey can feed on so many different things that even if they\u2019ve been feeding for multiple years and they\u2019ve kind of locally depleted trees in one particular area, they can just move on the next year,\u201d she said. \u201cConditions might not be perfect in the place that have been great for the last three generations, but then just over a little bit, those trees aren\u2019t depleted.\u2019<\/p>\n Stairway to \u2018Heaven\u2019 <\/p>\n A lanternfly nymph on a plant stalk. Christopher Sadowski<\/p>\n Part of their success is due to the growing presence in the region of the Tree Of Heaven, a similarly adaptable Asian invader that\u2019s taken New York by storm, providing an abundant and sustainable food source. <\/p>\n Urban said this tree of life \u201coutcompetes the heck out of other trees and plants\u201d because it produces toxic chemicals that \u201cknock out other trees.\u201d<\/p>\n It also likes to \u201cgrow in disturbed corridors,\u201d per Urban, who added, \u201cyou can see it all along I- 95.\u201d<\/p>\n Like with many Big Apple transplants, city living has helped make these insects more resilient, per a recent study. <\/p>\n \u201cCities may act as evolutionary incubators that help an\u00a0invasive species\u00a0to better deal with pressures like heat and pesticides, which then helps them to better adapt to new environments,\u201d study lead author\u00a0Fallon (Fang) Meng, a biologist at New York University, told Live Science.<\/a><\/p>\n A real fly in the ointment<\/p>\n Spotted lanternfly nymphs hatch from an egg case in Pennsylvania. Nancy J. Ondra \u2013 stock.adobe.com<\/p>\n Thankfully, for New Yorkers, the impact is more irritating than apocalyptic \u2014 but hard to ignore. \u201cPeople don\u2019t like bugs hitting them upside the head,\u201d said Urban, adding that they excrete sugary \u201choneydew\u201d that\u2019s a magnet for \u201csooty mold.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe see it [the fungus] darkening people\u2019s decks,\u201d the bug buff explained. \u201cSo from the nuisance factor, it could contribute to potentially a loss of tourism.\u201d<\/p>\n Meanwhile, Bloom, who is frequently tasked with clearing the bugs from landscaped areas on the Upper West and Upper East Side, observed that the droppings on infested trees and fences can attract stinging wasps.<\/p>\n Contrary to popular belief, however, the bugs don\u2019t actually kill most trees but rather slow them down by scaling back photosynthesis. \u201cIt\u2019ll reduce starch levels in the roots and whatnot, but it doesn\u2019t knock it out,\u201d said Urban. \u201cIt\u2019s a stressor like anything else. And so that\u2019s the good news.\u201d<\/p>\n