Overview
- County inspectors found glassy‑winged sharpshooter egg masses on desert willow shipments at Costco stores in Sacramento and Marin counties in late June and destroyed most of the stock.
- Sacramento officials reported destroying 209 of 215 plants from the shipment and continue to search for six unaccounted plants while Marin destroyed all 24 it received before any were sold.
- The desert willows were traced to a nursery in Tyler, Texas and arrived without the required inspection notices, a lapse officials say violates state quarantine rules for interstate nursery shipments.
- State and federal lawmakers and agriculture officials have pressed for roughly $32 million in emergency funds and expanded trapping and inspections to prevent the pest from establishing near vineyards.
- The glassy‑winged sharpshooter transmits Pierce’s disease, an incurable bacterial infection that can kill grapevines, so officials are urging anyone who bought affected plants to isolate them and contact their county agricultural commissioner.