Mesa County has received a $110,000 grant to help fund efforts to eradicate the Japanese beetle.

The Colorado Department of Agriculture (CDA) awarded the grant to battle the beetles, an invasive pest that damages agricultural crops as well as ornamental plants and turf grass.

“CDA is committed to protecting the Western Slope from this voracious pest that feeds on both agricultural and decorative plants,” said Wondirad Gebru, director of the department’s plant industry division. “Based on our previous experience of eradicating the Japanese beetle, its complete eradication will take from five to six years, But we should start seeing a dramatic decline in beetles in the second and third year of the treatment, hopefully this year and next.”

Mesa County Commissioner Bobbie Daniel said she was grateful for the grant. “These funds will go a long way to strengthen our initiatives to eliminate as many Japanese beetles as possible, preventing further spread throughout the county. The grant will partially fund our 2024 spray program in the hot zone, where we are currently treating approximately 1,300 properties.”

Japanese beetles were discovered in Grand Junction in the summer of 2022. The beetles feed on more than 300 species of plants, many of which are essential to western Colorado’s agricultural economy — including peaches, grapes and sweet corn — as well as many other ornamental plants in urban spaces, including turf grass. The presence of the beetle also affects exports of plants out of Mesa County to areas without Japanese beetles — including New Mexico — that have denied the exports.

Beetles likely were brought in by a sod farm from the Front Range that violated the Japanese beetle quarantine. Mesa County Commissioner declared in March 2023 the beetle to be a public nuisance pest requiring eradication.

Since 2022, CDA has worked with Mesa County Noxious Weed and Pest Management, the City of Grand Junction and Colorado State University Tri-River Extension to set up traps that monitor the presence of the pest across the affected area. The partnership has also extended to working on eradicating the pest for the past two years.

CDA funding will support eradication efforts by covering the cost for the personnel, materials and monitoring of the traps.

The Western Slope successfully staved off the beetle in the past. In 2002, a master gardener discovered the pest in the Grand Valley. The Upper Grand Valley Pest Control District eradicated the pest and reduced its population by 99 percent over five years.

The Pest Control Act gives CDA the authority to establish an intrastate quarantine to restrict the movement of nursery materials and pests to the Western Slope to protect the fruit and wine industry. A quarantine is in place that prevents the import of commodities that carry the pest from affected states and quarantined counties — including those on the Front Range — to areas not under quarantine. That includes Mesa County.