CHARLOTTE, N.C. — An inch-long invader may be taking over your yard, and as the city of Charlotte told WCNC Charlotte meteorologist KJ Jacobs, many of you have been calling the city about the impacts you’ve spotted.
Orange-striped oakworms are only active once yearly- and that time is now!
Charlotte City Arborist Laurie Reid said she has gotten a lot of calls about the worms being a nuisance.
Two of the main impacts are frass and defoliation. By the way, frass is another way of saying "poop."
“It looks like tiny little pellets," Reid said about the frass. "It will be on the ground and pretty good size as the caterpillars get bigger. So, if you have a back deck and the caterpillars are eating the leaves on a tree, you can hear the frass falling down and you’ll see it on your deck.”
They will defoliate your trees. Once the leaves are gone, the trees will remain bare until next spring.
"Sometimes the leaves will be half eaten, sometimes the branches will be completely bare, so you’ll just have these little twigs where there used to be leaves on top," Reid said. "So, it’s very startling to see a tree that has been green all summer and all of a sudden, all the leaves have been eaten off."
Reid says orange-striped oakworms are indeed harmless to both you and your oak tree.
In fact, this could be a good hands-on opportunity to educate kids about nature and the life cycle of worms.
Contact KJ Jacobs at kjacobs3@wcnc.com and follow him on Facebook, X and Instagram.
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