Kate Hrinkevich

The mountain pine beetle (mpb) (Dendroctonus ponderosae) is anative bark beetle of forests in B.C., and there is documented evidenceof outbreaks dating back to 1910. The current outbreak is substantiallylarger than past, documented outbreaks, but the temporal scale oflandscape-level forest change is much longer than the limited scope ofrecorded history. It is possible that the scale of management-inducedchanges to forest structure through fire suppression and forestrypractices, and the mounting evidence of a changing climate, havecontributed to an outbreak that is well outside the natural range ofvariation. The purpose of this project is to determine the magnitudeand synchrony of historical beetle outbreaks in sub-boreal forests ofcentral B.C.,

and to relate those elements with climate factors andchanges in fire regimes. Our intent is to focus on the central andnorth-central part of BC, in areas that in the past have been lessconducive to large scale mpb outbreaks, and less influenced by firesuppression, to determine whether or not the current outbreak in thisarea is due to the enormous population build-up alone, or whetherchanges in climate and/or fire regime have played a role.