Many of our neighbors have expressed concerns regarding the grubs and beetles that were observed on the ball fields during mid-July. The Park Advisory Council shared these concerns and our own with the Chicago Park District and received the following reply:
Thank you for your message and your concern for Welles Park.
The Chicago Park District is committed to addressing the presence of June beetles and grubs (the larval stage of the beetle) at Welles Park. We are working on a new plan of action that began with the first insecticide treatment by a new contractor earlier this spring. Our in-house workforce also aerated and seeded the field to encourage stronger grass growth.
Christy Webber is the new contractor for this project that started in the spring with the first treatment this year, and will continue with the revised plan to apply multiple treatments at the most vulnerable stages of the beetle’s lifecycle. The June beetles that you are seeing now in the park are the mature, adult stage of the insect. The adult phase of the life cycle is short-lived, and we expect they will only be visible for a couple more weeks. The beetles are not harmful to humans, and in their adult form they do not cause landscape damage.
We will apply insecticide treatment two more times this fall when the beetles are in vulnerable stages of their life cycles. We will also continue to aerate and seed the field in the fall and spring when weather conditions are best for grass seed germination. We will follow up with two more treatments next spring to prevent grubs from eating the roots of the turf grass.
If necessary, we plan to continue this approach of treating the insects twice in the spring and twice in the fall next year, along with continued aeration and seeding of the field. We are optimistic that this approach will prevent the kind of turf damage that required a closure of the field in the spring. June bugs are a natural part of our environment, so we do not expect to eliminate them completely, but we hope continued monitoring and treatment will prevent another population surge that causes turf damage.
Thank you again and best regards,
Cathy Breitenbach, Director of Cultural and Natural Resources, Chicago Park District
The Welles Park Advisory Council will continue to monitor the issue and advocate on behalf of all users of the park to address these pests.
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