Betula populifolia the female catkins erect. The fruit, maturing in autumn, is composed of many tiny winged seeds packed between the catkin bracts. The wood is medium hard and is used for high grade plywood, furniture, drum shells, spools and firewood. Like other North American birches, gray birch is highly resistant to the Bronze birch borer ("Agrilus anxius"). The leaves of the gray birch serve as food for various Lepidoptera, such as the leaf miner moth "Cameraria betulivora". Between about 1930 and 1950, many gray birch trees, along with paper birch and yellow birch ("Betula alleghaniensis"), were affected and killed by birch
Beech bark disease to spread to the south and west. The first case of beech bark disease in the United States was reported in 1929 in Massachusetts. By 2004, the disease had spread as far west as Michigan and as far south as western North Carolina. For beech bark disease to occur, two components are required, an insect and a fungus. The beech scale insect, "Cryptococcus fagisuga", is invasive to North America and is host-specific, feeding exclusively on beech trees. It can be observed on the trunk and limbs of the tree as woolly, white tufts that will later develop into broad strips.