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Emerald Ash Borer

There’s nothing more calming and downright medicinal than taking a long walk through some our region’s beautiful hardwood forests. Pacing among the trunks of old trees, listening to the breeze lightly blow the leaves or – in the winter – the winds bend the branches. It’s perfection, all brought to you by nature.

During one of my recent walks, I was sad to see so many of these old-growth trees with small, D-shaped holes in their bark. Noticing these marks brought me from “meditative calm” to “moderate existential panic” pretty quickly. Why? These trees – most of which are ash trees – had been infected by an invasive species so damaging that we could see the complete eradication of ash trees in our region as a result. The emerald ash borer has been in Maryland since 2015 and has wreaked havoc on our ash trees since.

As chief executive officer, John Racanelli leads a team of 600 full and part-time employees and 1,000 volunteers in pursuing the National Aquarium’s mission to inspire conservation of the world’s aquatic treasures. More than 1.5 million people annually visit the Aquarium’s venue in Baltimore, Maryland, while millions more are touched by the Aquarium’s education programs, outreach activities, social media campaigns and conservation initiatives.