On a recent June day, Matt Drury , the Appalachian Trail Conservancy’s associate director of science and stewardship, tapped a nail securing a round metal tag etched with the number 213 into a white ash tree along the Tennessee-North Carolina border on a ridge separating the Pisgah and Cherokee National Forests.
It’s one of more than 800 ash trees that the Appalachian Trail Conservancy , ATC, is protecting from the emerald ash borer, an invasive beetle from Asia. Each of the protected trees in North Carolina, Tennessee and Georgia receives number and is marked on a map with its GPS coordinates.
Since its discovery in the U.S. in 2002, the emerald ash borer has devastated millions of white ash trees and other ash species throughout North America, making Drury’s work critical for the future of ash trees in the Southern Appalachians .
“Rarely do I see one that isn’t impacted by the (emerald ash borer),” Drury said. “This is incredibly urgent since it kills trees so quickly. We want to be in a position to keep white ash alive on the landscape.”