bark beetle

Bark beetle (Dendroctonus valens)

(credit: William E. Ferguson)

Any member of the beetle family Scolytidae, many of which severely damage trees. Bark beetles are cylindrical, brown or black, and usually less than 0.25 in. (6 mm) long. A male and females (as many as 60 females with each male) bore into a tree and form a chamber where each female deposits her eggs. The emerging larvae bore away from the chamber, forming a characteristic series of tunnels. Different species attack particular trees, damaging roots, stems, seeds, or fruits. Some species transmit disease (e.g., elm bark beetles carry spores of the fungal Dutch elm disease).

It builds soil; reduces the threat of bark beetle and other insects, mistletoe, and disease; reduces threat of catastrophic fire; puts moisture and nutrients into faster-growing, better quality/more valuable stems; increases grasses and forbs for grazing; permanently stores more carbon; and encourages natural regeneration from seeds of the higher-quality residuals.

Economics of forest restoration: the case for careful logging is made ... by Beebe, Spencer / American Forests

Wrightwood buildings generally have composite shingles rather than wood shingles, its weather had not been as dry as in the San Bernardino Mountains and the types of trees around it face a different, less numerous and less aggressive sort of bark beetle than trees in the San Bernardino Mountains, the survey said.

FIRE CREWS CLEARING FOREST ROUTES AROUND WRIGHTWOOD DENSELY CLUSTERED ... by Daily News (Los Angeles, CA)

At sites across four states, a team headed by David Breshears of the University of Arizona in Tucson found that 40 to 80 percent of the pine nut-producing trees died during the drought and its plague of bark beetles.

Drought's heat killed Southwest's pinon forests by Harder, B. / Science News

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