Currently viewing the tag: "bark beetles"

Follow The Money

On February 10, 2022 By

 

Biologist radio tracking wolves in Montana. Photo George Wuerthner 

Years ago, I was in a graduate wildlife biology seminar where we discussed major issues of the day. At one of the meetings, the topic was finding work in wildlife research. There were three wildlife biology professors presenting that day. After they […]

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The 99-Year Old Grandmother Argument–The Bias of Forestry Advocates

On March 30, 2021 By

 

To many foresters and others who advocate for “active forest management,” a fire that results in high tree mortality is considered evidence of an “unhealthy” forest. Photo George Wuerthner 

This past week I was invited to present my views on forest health and fire ecology to a group of Washington State […]

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Institutional Bias of Forestry School Research

On March 10, 2021 By

 

Foresters want to remove large old-growth fir trees greater than 21 inches from the Blue Mountain Ecosystems in the name of forest restoration. Photo George Wuerthner 

Institutional bias doesn’t just exist in race relationships. The Forest Service and Forestry Schools have been the handmaiden of the timber industry for so long […]

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North Bridger Range Forest Health Project Subterfuge

On August 17, 2018 By

The proposed North Bridger “forest health” project on the Gallatin National Forest north of Bozeman, Montana near the already heavily logged area by Bridger Bowl is based on numerous false assumptions. The proposal displays the Forest Service’s Industrial Forestry bias and its subterfuge of science.

The public no longer gives the agency a “social license” […]

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Forests or trees?

On July 23, 2018 By

“What but the wolf’s tooth whittled so fine the fleet limbs of the antelope?” wrote the poet Robinson Jeffers.

Jeffers encapsulated the idea that evolutionary processes shape all plants and animals.  Unfortunately, far too many in the Forest Service and the collaboratives that work with them fail to understand this basic idea—a “healthy” forest is […]

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Baucus Beetle Amendment To Farm Bill Bad For Forest Ecosystems

On June 21, 2012 By

Despite the ecological reality that beetle-kill is part of healthy functioning forest ecosystem, Montana Senator Max Baucus successfully added an amendment to the Farm Bill that would provide additional funds to log beetle killed trees as well as “stream line” the process of getting out timber sales. Baucus stated this would be “good news” to […]

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Researchers turn up the noise to battle bark beetles

On February 15, 2010 By

Is artificial bark beetle noise a silver bullet?

Except at great expense and on a small scale, insecticides, logging or pheromone traps haven’t touched this beetle epidemic that extends from the Yukon to New Mexico.  Here is some thinking outside the box that might work. Of course, it too might only work over small areas.

[…]

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Sen. Udall sponsors bill to attack pine beetles

On November 30, 2009 By

Colorado Democrat Udall says his bill will combat a great natural disaster-

Yes there are millions of  acres of beetle killed pine trees in Colorado, but also Wyoming, Utah, Idaho, Montana, eastern Oregon and Washington, New Mexico, British Columbia, Alberta and the Yukon. Local politicians respond to local demands to do something, but rarely do […]

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Bark Beetles Kill Millions of Acres of [Pine] Trees in West

On November 18, 2008 By

Beetle kill is hardly a local issue-

This is not the first I’ve posted articles about this, but it needs to repeated because of the continuing local perception that is an issue for a particular national forest or state without the recognition that pine trees (but not necessarily other kinds of conifers) are dying by […]

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Critics hit bill on bark beetles. Senator Barrasso’s forest bill claims called ‘dishonest.’

On January 3, 2008 By

Earlier I posted about Wyoming US Senator John Barrasso’s “Wyoming Forest and Watershed Restoration Act of 2007” which would allow the state of Wyoming to subcontract US Forest Service lands to timber companies with the notion that this would somehow stop the beetle epidemic that is sweeping the state (actually sweeping most of the […]

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Quote

‎"At some point we must draw a line across the ground of our home and our being, drive a spear into the land and say to the bulldozers, earthmovers, government and corporations, “thus far and no further.” If we do not, we shall later feel, instead of pride, the regret of Thoreau, that good but overly-bookish man, who wrote, near the end of his life, “If I repent of anything it is likely to be my good behaviour."

~ Edward Abbey