I live on the Costa Blanca am surrounded by holiday homes so no-one there most of the time. However, I've spotted a couple of palms that have obviously got red palm weevils (they call them Picudos Rojos in Spain).

My palms are regularly injected but I've been told that's no guarantee of safety.

I have no way of contacting the home owners so now what do I do? Any guidance much appreciated. All the Ayuntamiento says is that it's the home-owner's responsiblity to remove the trees ! Great!!!!

We lost a beautiful palm to the weevils at our old house.

For the absent owners of the trees around you I doubt there will be little that you can do but watch them die and probably more will get affected also.

... and that's the point really. Shouldn't the infected palm be cut down and burned to avoid the little devils moving on else where?

I have spent a small fortune trying to save my palms but are gradually losing them.

The beetles are an unstopable plague.

I bought a special spray and so far so good, no idea what it is called (and not at home) but they will know in a specialist garden chemicals shop.

I've seen men spraying these trees and they were completely covered with protection, body, eyes, face and head. I hope you were! Also,signs were left on the trees afterwards, warning the public.
BTW, how do these things travel? Do they fly or just crawl?

They fly, hence no stopping the plague.

The grubs are huge and stink like hell.

We lost 3 very mature ones, they were around 40 yrs old at least. All our neighbours lost theirs too We saw a few affected in Italy too. A couple of years ago there were companies going around selling a monthly cure and prevention contract but it was a con.

One easily available insecticide that is used is Imidacloprid - sold in the generic form or as Confidor - much more expensive.

Spraying the palms requires up to 20 litres of diluted chemical for each palm and that will be expensive and it needs to be done monthly.

Phemerone traps have had some success but we are not winning the battle! The problem is that the dead palms should be removed and burned but the Ayuntamientos now say that it is the responsibility of the owner. That's expensive so it isn't done and the larvae grow in the dead palm, hatch out and leave to attack more palms nearby.

Note that it is normally only the date palms that are affected. The equally common Washingtonia palms can be affected but it is very rare.

The ones that are a problem are

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_canariensis
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_dactylifera

This is the other, equally common but less affected palm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washingtonia

Isn't the OP's problem that it is a not-present neighbour whose palms are affected? What can she/the ayuntamiento do about it?

Basically - nothing at all - apart from taking preventative measures on her own palms.

The Ayuntamiento can't/won't afford the cost. I'm guessing that it probably costs €500 to dig up and dispose of a tree and there are thousands of them.

The once-dead palms can't be burnt (I've tried), and, according to our town hall, must be triturado - that's to say 'ground up'. Not much chance of that!
They are very hard to cut down as well. The fibrous trunk is hard for a chain saw.
Until and unless some natural predator comes along and attacks the weevils, we will probably lose most of our palms in the next couple of years.

We have lost 3 large mature palm trees and our remaining 2 I don't think will be around for very much longer. They were treated for the last 4 years, sprayed, injected, traps set as well but all in vain, there are too many dying trees around which are not being attended to, so I have decided that there is no point throwing more money at an impossible situation. I seem to see a new dead tree everyday, a healthy palm is becoming a very rare sight.

All our palms are very big and in positions that are difficult to access to remove entirely without wrecking drives and pathways etc.

As an experiment I got my gardener to remove all the foliage and using a chainsaw clean the trunk back to a solid lump and soak with a creosote type of liquid. We left it for one year and there was no sign of beetle (probably because it eats the soft new growth in the heart of the palm).

Immediately when leaves collapse on our other palms we have done the same.
When I am sure that the beetle cant or doesnt want to eat the rock hard stumps I intend to grow trailing plants over them to disguise them.

I'm watching one die as I speak and I've tried everything to save it. They are dying all around the area, a sad sight. The town hall have attempted to save a few of the ones in public places, but to no avail. Once the leaves are dead, they remove them and cover the stump with white sheeting. And just leave them there.