Choose Outdoors Org
- Connecting Americans to Public Land through Outdoor Recreation
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In November, 2011, Choose Outdoors convened a conference to discuss "battling the pine beetle". Held at the REI Flagship store in Denver, concerned people from across Colorado, as well as scientists, home builders, business owners and forest managers gathered to learn more about the bark beetle and what can be done to stem the tide of destruction. A series of short films documented the alarmingly rapid spread of what the USDA Forest Service is calling an Incident, and others have described as an ecological catastrophe.
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Choose Outdoors has been working with the USDA Forest Service, Colorado State University and a spectrum of other stakeholders attempting to mitigate this naturally occurring epidemic which has affected forests and forest-based recreation in the Rocky Mountains from Canada to Mexico. More than 20 million acres of lodge pole pine forests in the Rockies have been killed to date, resulting in large expanses of dead trees, increased fire danger, watershed degradation and power line impact.
Perry Cadmen of New Town Builders talked about the complications of building with beetle killed wood, simply because of widely held misconceptions about the quality of the wood. The wood has an unusual and attractive pale blue stain, but is exactly as strong as fresh cut wood and contains no more potential for causing an insect infestation than any other wood used for building - but many people have difficulty accepting this repeatedly proven information.
Cal Wettstein - USDA Forest Service, Incident Commander Rocky Mt Bark Beetle, shed light on the issue. This mass tree die - off is naturally occurring, although there are reasons to believe that anthropogenic causes have exacerbated the situation - and that certain interventions can make a positive difference.
