Brits have been warned to be on the lookout for a dangerous insect which could cause problems for our lovely trees.

The government has announced that across the south of England and East Anglia there will be some requirements as part of the attempts to contain and eradicate the pest.

These will kick in from 12 June onwards, and it bans cutting down or moving spruce trees without the Forestry Commission’s say-so for fear that it’ll transport the invasive insect around the country.

The zone these restrictions were in place for used to consist of Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire, Surrey, City of London, Greater London, West Sussex, East Sussex, Kent, Essex and Hampshire.

However, that’s now going to be widened to include Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire, Lincolnshire, Norfolk, and Suffolk.

Watch out for this thing, they can f**k up a nation’s timber industry. (Getty Stock Image)

Basically, that’s quite a lot of the south of England where movement of wood, bark and wood chips is restricted because contained within could be this awful insect.

It’s known as the eight-toothed spruce bark beetle, and they were first spotted in the UK in Kent in 2018.

These little s***s normally go after stressed or dying trees, but the beetles sometimes target healthy wood and can wreak havoc on the UK’s timber industry.

They can travel up to half a mile in search of a suitable tree to destroy, and when they find a target they burrow into the bark so they can build tunnels and lay eggs.

Sometimes they’ll then move on to another tree and do it all over again, and when the eggs hatch the larvae feed as they are buried beneath the bark.

These are eight-toothed spruced bark beetles, and they burrow into trees so they can devour them. (Getty Stock Image)

They’re present in spruce trees across much of Europe, and some trees in Asia too.

The adults grow to about 5mm long in size, so seeing them can be a bit difficult, and they damage the channels through which trees transport water and nutrients.

This means that part of the tree might die away as a result of not getting enough of the good stuff, and in some cases they can kill the entire tree.

While they tend to target dead or dying trees, if there’s enough of them they’ll spread to the living ones as well.

If you see a living tree with an unseasonably brown crown that might be a sign of the beetles burrowed within, as their impact will start to kill off the tree’s extremities.

Folks who spot the signs of the eight-toothed spruce bark beetle should ‘remain vigilant’ and are supposed to raise the alarm.

Featured Image Credit: Getty Stock Images

Topics: Animals, UK News, Environment