A small insect that could wreak havoc on Nova Scotia’s eastern hemlock has been thwarted in an old booth – at least in the short term – by volunteer efforts led by a man better known for fighting human disease.
Dr. George Kovacs is a doctor in the emergency department at Halifax who, in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, developed the Nova Scotia protocol for the care of the sickest patients.
Between hospital shifts in 2021, he also organized a mission to try to save a plantation from an old eastern hemlock in the Tobeatic desert area. The enemy? The hemlock woolly adelgide, an invasive aphid-like species that has been killing hemlock in Nova Scotia since 2017.
“This is a pandemic affecting the trees,” Kovacs said.
After raising more than $ 125,000 to cover the cost of an insecticide that killed Adelgid, Kovacs and other volunteers moved and rowed to Sporting Lake Island in October 2021 to inoculate a rare old hemlock plantation.
It was a “life-changing experience for many people, including me,” he said.
A branch of hemlock infected with adelgide. (Parks Canada)
The volunteers worked for about two weeks from a complex base camp that housed everything from a safe insecticide storage facility to a drinking water filtration system and even a small cell tower.
The effort was a race against time, as the woolly adelgide of hemlock was already present among the trees. The insect, which originates from the northwestern Pacific and Japan, feeds on the sugars of the tree and thus can kill hemlock in just three years.
“We treat or let them die. And that’s certain death,” said Donna Crossland, a volunteer and forest ecologist who is one of Nova Scotia’s leading insect experts.
Dr. George Kovacs is usually in the emergency department of Halifax. How did he come to lead a volunteer effort against a “pandemic affecting trees” in the Nova Scotia desert? CBC’s Fleece McGregor explores this in his documentary.
Scott Robinson was the first person to sound the alarm about adelgide in the huts of Sporting Lake.
“I’m looting a lot on Tobeatic, and if I came here and all the trees were dead, which will certainly happen if they don’t heal, I just couldn’t handle it unless I could look at the trees and say, ‘You know.’ “What? I did my best to save you,” said Robinson, a professional arborist.
Robinson had previous experience injecting hemlock with the insecticide at the Kovacs Family Villa on the Medway River in Queens County.
Professional arborist Scott Robinson is licensed to use the insecticide that kills hemlock adelgide. He was seen here inoculating hemlock on Sporting Island. (Fleece McGregor / CBC)
Kovacs’ parents, Hungarian immigrants and Holocaust survivors, bought the land in 1972. “Owning land was important,” he said.
Kovacs built the villa, which is surrounded by hemlock, and it is there that his family has a special connection to what he calls a “beautiful, majestic tree.”
“This land has just become our family place, although my parents did not have the opportunity to experience it, they would be very, very proud of what this place has become,” he said.
When the hemlock woolly adelgide revealed its presence around its villa, “it was a devastating feeling,” he said.
“Your efforts matter”
Robinson inoculated Kovacs’ trees in hopes of fighting the pest – and mentioned that there was a threat to an old growth stand in Sporting Lake. Robinson failed to attract the attention of the provincial government and asked Kovacs if he would donate a liter of insecticide to Robinson’s previous independent cause.
Blacksmith called him a few weeks later with a promise to try to save the entire Sporting Lake grandstand.
“It’s finally in the right ears,” Robinson said.
Kovacs began gathering like-minded volunteers, ending a major effort in October on Sporting Lake.
“You have to fight for things that are important,” Kovacs said.
Forest ecologist Donna Crossland is one of Nova Scotia’s leading experts on hemlock adelgide and one of the volunteers who helped inoculate the stand on Sporting Island. (Fleece McGregor / CBC)
Kovacs and the other volunteers eventually inoculated more than 2,000 hemlock. This is not a long-term solution, but the volunteers hope it can bridge the gap while there are more tools in the arsenal against adelgid.
“It was an example that people can come together and your efforts matter,” Kovacs said. “At a time when there is so much negativity in the world and so much suffering, getting people together to do something incredibly good was magic.
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