Bronze birch borer

Description

Agrilus anxius, the bronze birch borer, is a wood-boring buprestid beetle native to North America, more numerous in warmer parts of the continent and rare in the north.It is a serious pest on birch trees (Betula), frequently killing them. The river birch Betula nigra is the most resistant species, other American birches less so, while the European and Asian birches have no resistance to it at all and are effectively impossible to grow in the eastern United States as a result. It is closely related to the emerald ash borer. Agrilus is a genus of jewel beetles, notable for having the largest number of species (about 3000) of any single genus in the animal kingdom.