The trees growing in a Belle Chasse citrus grove are healthy -- and it's owner, Ricky Becnel, wants to make sure they stay that way.

"Our nursery is constantly sprayed. We spray on a weekly basis," he said.  “The USDA is constantly coming in and monitoring with their little sticky traps, but we do not have this insect in our nursery."

An insect called the asian psyllid, an invasive species that becnel wants to keep out of his trees because the insect carries a disease called citrus greening. The disease can wreak havoc on citrus trees because once infected the trees end up producing bitter and misshapen fruit.

"This devastated Florida,” said Plaquemines Parish President Billy Nungesser, “where they couldn't ship a tree out of Florida for many years and it still crippled the industry in Florida, so we want to make sure that doesn't happen here in Plaquemines Parish."

In response, the parish is launching a new program to try and inoculate all the citrus trees in the parish and prevent them from getting the greening disease.

“We'll be spraying the commercial groves overhead by helicopter, and then individual homes, we'll be treating with this pill," said Nungesser.

The pill is an insecticide tablet the parish plans to send out teams to homes which have citrus trees in their yards.  Growers are advised to plant the tablets four inches below the ground around the tree.

"What they're going to do is put them in the root area around the tree and then it's going to be taken up systemically through the tree," Natalie Hummel, from the LSU Agcenter.

Once that happens, if an asian psyllid bites the tree, it will die and officials hope that will stop the spread of the citrus greening.  It's a disease for which there is no cure once a tree is infected.

"The only thing to do when you find the greening is, really, to remove the tree because there is no treatment for the greening right now," said Hummel.

Ricky Becnel says he hopes homeowners will do their part to protect the $15 million citrus industry in Plaquemines Parish.

"It is to protect our industry,” Becnel said. “It is the industry that needs to be safe and protected."