The range of host plants for this insect is very broad with 126 known host plants in the tropics. In the U.S., known hosts include pecan, peach, plum, cherry, persimmon, golden rain tree, sweet gumf Shumard oak Chinese elm, sweet potato and magnolia. The Asian ambrosia beetle is very small but infestations can be quite obvious. Female beetles are 2.1 to 2.9 mm long, stout bodied and reddish brown. The males are much smaller, being 1.5 mm long and have a more hunch back appearance.
Males are also flightless and much less numerous than females.
Infestations start with a female beetle boring in to a twig, branch or trunk of a host plant. Unlike other wood infesting, beetles that seem to prefer trees under stress, the Asian ambrosia beetle will attack seemingly healthy trees. Infestations by this beetle can be very obvious. When female beetles are excavating galleries they push out strings of boring dust which will resemble tooth picks. These protrusions can be up to an inch in length and are quite obYious, often with several hundred on an individual tree.