For Release: July 9, 1997

Contact: Tom Bourn 647-3367

Stephanie Powell 277-2771 ext. 4418

PROVIDENCE - Some West Greenwich residents might be wondering what has eaten the foliage from their oak trees. No, it's not gypsy moths, as some have asked the RI Department of Environmental Management's Division of Forest Environment.

It is just forest tent caterpillars, and although oak trees in a couple of West Greenwich neighborhoods don't look too well right now, most will recover, according to Cathy Sparks, principal forester of DEM.

In their caterpillar stage, the two-inch long insects defoliated a total of 500 to 700 separated acres, Sparks said, but they are now in their cocoon stage from which they will emerge as light brown moths, and the trees are refoliating. Most should recover.

"They're a native pest," Sparks said, "and a natural condition of the forest." As a general rule, she said, they don't persist as a nuisance from year to year.