Resource managers at Great Smoky Mountains National Park are pursuing a biological version of fighting “fire with fire” by releasing a non-native insect to control the spread of another.

Recently park biologists, assisted by U.S. Forest Service entomologists, began an experimental release of 10,000 tiny black predator beetles at four sites in the park in an effort to control infestations of the exotic hemlock woolly adelgid, an Asian adelgid that can kill a majority of the hemlock trees it attacks as quickly as within three to five years.

Since the hemlock woolly adelgid infestation was first confirmed in the park in mid-May, park biologists have been aggressively on the lookout for infestations and confirmed nine infested stands of hemlock. These stands are scattered from Cataloochee just west of I-40 to Cades Cove and Panther Creek near U.S. 129 on the west end of the park. Other areas most likely will be located throughout the half-million-acre park, making it imperative to begin an active control effort.

The park introduced the predator beetle, Pseudoscymnus tsugae, at four highly infested locations upon advice from the U.S. Forest Service and after consulting with the states of Tennessee and North Carolina, Western Carolina University and The University of Tennessee. The sites are Cataloochee in North Carolina and the Panther Creek, Laurel Falls and Stony Branch areas in Tennessee.