Crisia Tabacaru, PhD Candidate at the University of Alberta, talks about the research completed for her thesis. The main objective of the work is to determine how burned lodgepole pine stands affect endemic Mountain Pine Beetle (MPB) populations in Alberta.
She talks about the various management options for the MPB and their effectiveness to date, listing cutting and burning trees as the most effective yet expensive option. She determined that MPB are attracted to the burn areas, but these areas act as a population sink. Research was focused on three study sites in the Rocky Mountains of Alberta, and included plots with low and moderate level burns and an unburned control area near the burned sites.
In an effort to understand why MPB colonization decreases in burned areas, bugs were trapped by three methods, and identified. Her theory is that this is occurring because of the subcortal community. This presentation was a part of the Mountain Pine Beetle Information Exchange Forum, April 2014.
