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Droughts in 2023 killed more than 12 million pine trees in Mississippi last year. With many of the trees threatening to demolish power lines and homes, people are scratching their heads about how to pay for their removal.
A report from the United States Department of Agriculture and the Mississippi Forestry Commission found that at least 12.5 million trees died in the state after droughts last year. That's nearly 80,000 acres worth of dead trees.
Mississippi experienced heavy droughts last year starting in June that were so bad that NASA could see the Mississippi River shrinking from space in September. During the droughts, experts say that pine beetles swept across the state taking out entire patches of decades-old pine trees.
The southern pine beetle, native to Mississippi, is "the most destructive beetle in the South," according to the Mississippi Forestry Commission. Trees that are weakened by natural disasters like flooding, windstorms, and especially droughts are susceptible to pine beetle outbreaks, the agency says.
On February 29, Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith, a Republican of Mississippi introduced a bill that would give the USDA "additional authorities" to help private landowners, timber businesses, and local municipalities with responding to forest-related natural disasters.
Mississippi timber farmers are expected to lose $96 million due to the disaster, according to Hyde-Smith.
Timber farming brings $3.3 billion of income to Mississippi a year, according to the state government.
Personal costs for people with dead trees on their property are also likely to climb to thousands of dollars. The Mississippi Forestry Commission says there is no federal or state program to help people remove trees from their property. Trees are considered "part of the maintenance of your property" by the state, according to the agency.
Pete Vozzo, operations manager for the city of Madison, a suburb of Jackson, told The Clarion Ledger it would cost the city around $12,000 to cut down eight dead trees near the highway.
"We have talked to dozens of vendors, and it is reasonable to expect that taking a tree down, whether it is in your yard or on the city's right of way, it is going to cost between $800 and $1,500, per tree," Vozzo told the outlet.
A representative for McCain Tree Service in Vicksburg, around 60 miles from Madison, told Business Insider that the company is cutting down far more pine trees than it normally would this time of year due to pine beetles.
Rates for cutting down the trees vary depending on accessibility factors, like if the tree is near power lines or if it's in an area that is not accessible by truck, McCain told BI.
Madison declared a continued state of emergency on February 6 and requested assistance from the state to address the extreme drought, subsequent beetle infestation, and damage resulting from the infestation, minutes show. Vozzo said he isn't entirely sure how the county is going to pay for all the trees it needs cut down.
"We are in a position where we are going to have to do something," Vozzo told The Clarion Ledger. "We just don't know how we are going to fund it."
Mississippi's Central Public Service Commissioner, De'Keither Stamps, sent a letter to state Gov. Tate Reeves in January asking him to declare the dead trees a state of emergency but did not hear back, he told The Clarion Ledger.
"They are going to start falling any day," Stamps told the outlet. "And that impacts us because when these trees start falling, they are going to fall on power lines."
Vozzo and Stamps did not immediately return Business Insider's requests for comment.
