Emerald Ash Borer in Dane County: What Every Madison-Area Homeowner Should Do Now
June 18, 2026
If you own a home anywhere in Dane County, there is a good chance you have — or recently had — an ash tree. Emerald ash borer (EAB) has now spread through Madison and every surrounding community, and the beetle is fatal to untreated ash. The question for most homeowners is no longer whether their ash will be affected, but whether to treat it or remove it.
How to tell if your ash tree is infested
EAB works from the top down and the inside out, so the early signs are easy to miss. Walk your tree and look for:
- Thinning or dying branches at the very top of the canopy
- New shoots (suckers) sprouting from the trunk or base
- D-shaped exit holes about 1/8 inch wide in the bark
- Vertical splits in the bark, often with S-shaped tunnels underneath
- Heavy woodpecker activity — they strip bark chasing the larvae
Treat or remove?
A healthy ash with less than about 30% canopy loss can often be saved with trunk-injection treatment repeated every couple of years. Once a tree is further gone than that, treatment stops being worth the money and the tree becomes a hazard — dead ash turns brittle fast and drops limbs without warning, which makes removal more dangerous (and more expensive) the longer you wait.
The honest answer depends on the tree. A structurally sound ash shading your house is worth protecting. A declining ash over the driveway is a removal you want done while the wood is still stable. We will tell you which one you have — not just quote the removal.
What removal costs around Madison
Ash removal is priced by size and access, not by species. A medium neighborhood ash typically runs in the mid-hundreds to low thousands; large lot trees near the house or power lines cost more because they require rigging or a crane. The fastest way to get a real number is our instant estimator — pick "Tree Removal," choose the size, and it quotes a fair market rate in under a minute.