Speakout: Battle beetles, not our state's forests

Joshua Ruschhaupt

Friday, May 12, 2006

The Colorado State Forest Service, in its "2005 Report on the Health of Colorado's Forests" (www.colostate.edu/Depts/CSFS/) and other studies, verifies that the current explosion in the bark beetle population is caused by droughts, warmer temperatures and shorter winters in recent decades, forests lacking a diversity of age classes, overgrazed new forest growth from "lazy" ungulates (including unshepherded livestock on public lands) with no predator-prey interaction (predators improve forests, riparian zones and would likely reduce the proliferation of chronic wasting disease) and more than a century of fire suppression.

However, the state and federal forest services seem to be obsessed with clear-cutting as a cure-all for fighting bark beetles.

The native bark beetles (there are actually many species in Colorado) are exploiting prime breeding conditions, and are not some alien infestation that needs be eradicated.

There are nondestructive methods of identifying and managing the affected stands of trees and forests. One example is from two college students working successfully on new technology that will identify specific trees harboring beetles using a handheld device (www.freenewmexican.com/news/33969.html). Other examples are pheromones, short- chain alcohols, and monoterpenes that will either attract the beetles in order to kill them or, conversely, repel them in order to protect trees or guide migrations (www.wcrl.ars.usda.gov/cec/z51-abs.htm, www.wcrl.ars.usda.gov/cec/photo/v10.htm, or www.fs.fed.us/r1/helena/resources/mch_douglas_fir.pdf).

Here are a few practical and ecological observations for how we can address the causes of the situation:

• Rather than clear-cut trees that have become less resistant to wildfires through beetle damage, impose and enforce a 100-foot defensible perimeter around threatened buildings and provide incentives for fire-resistant home products. This works for California communities.

• Clear-cutting causes worse fire conditions, negatively affects the multibillion-dollar tourist economy, and does not promote a "healthy forest." I believe tourists would rather see burned forests that are beautiful through successional recovery than clear-cut ones. Yosemite's and Yellowstone's burgeoning tourist trade after recent "catastrophic" fires points the way. Also, sediment loading, landslides and habitat fragmentation from thousands of miles of Colorado's logging roads have a much greater impact and are longer lasting (centuries) than the relatively quicker recovery of a charred forest.

• Fire-suppression and overgrazing cause even-aged stands and forests that beetles thrive within. Mandate controlled burns over time to safely manage a natural and healthyforest. And at least consider the positive ecological and economic benefits of wolves - all Yellowstone studies are pointing in this direction.

• Global warming causes droughts, El Niños and the kind of unpredictable, severe weather that improves bark beetle habitat by stressing trees. Combating this problem will stem the tide of beetles, let alone so many other problems.

The natural processes that need to occur in forests will provide conditions for healthier tree immunity to fight a bark beetle population boom.

Bruce McCloskey, director of the Colorado Division of Wildlife, recently said about managing forests: "We're the experts and we should continue to be the experts. We need to provide that data and that data needs to (be) unedited by guys like me. It needs to come from on-the-ground folks" ("Wildlife chief: State must be on front lines," Aspen Times, April 13).

Those folks need the political aid and financial support of their director and our senators to back them up in Washington, D.C.

Protect and manage watersheds and forests ecologically, not mechanically. The forests seem to have been "healthy" before we got here.

Joshua Ruschhaupt is a resident of Aspen.