Sperryville, VA – Hemlock Springs Overlook, popular scenic view at milepost 39.7 in Shenandoah National Park, recently lost its namesake eastern hemlocks ( Tsuga canadensis ) to the global-reaching hemlock wooly adelgid aphid.

Since hemlock represents a climax forest that typically takes hundreds of years to develop, these Shenandoah hemlocks constituted a final botanical link to the pre-Shenandoah National Park era.

Efforts to combat the Asian-born wooly adelgid with Asian adelgid parasites are underway in Pennsylvania, at the Division of Forest Pest Management within the Pennsylvania Department of Forestry.  The Virginia attacks recently moved northward to compromise a northern Pennsylvania stand of that state’s State Tree.  Sam Cooke, a forester within the Department, notes that the Shenandoah hemlocks are isolated stands more vulnerable to insect infestation than trees in the heart of hemlock range, but that officials are monitoring closely the parasite’s northward movement.

The Shenandoah attack further debilitates a nationally known viewshed already rendered a brown streak in places by gypsy moth and acid rain. Charred treetrunks from a government evergreen restoration project which degenerated into wildfire further degrade the ridgeline aesthetics.