Is the pine beetle cross the continent?

Mountain pine beetles, the coastal pine forests in Western North America have devastated, were found in a new kind of structure, the jack pine. Jack pines cross the entire continent, which ultimately could magically pine trees on the East coast of the United. Cold temperatures keep the spread Bay currently, but they may not last as the climate warms.

The mountain pine beetle is a step closer to North America Cross and Eastern pine forests in the same bleak landscapes, which have drawn in the last years of the Mountain West.

Some scientists say it is inevitable that the tree killing insect East through a corridor of Jack pines all over Canada's northern boreal forest is distributed. The question is: when? Others are more skeptical.

In both cases researchers have now shown that the beetle has a new type of pine trees on the East side of the Rocky Mountains in Alberta, Canada, with serious consequences.

In a report published this week in molecular ecology to show invasion researchers DNA from trees on the border of the beetle, analyzed in Alberta that the beetle of Jack pines along with lodgepole pine, its typical now infested aims.

Can hybridize with lodgepole pine, Jack pines, it is difficult to be sure that an infected tree really a jack pine, rather than a hybrid. The genetic tests provided certainty for researchers suspected.

"" I was able to say: "Yes-this pine, are Jack that the mountain pine beetle, attacked by been" "Catherine Cullingham said of the University of Alberta in Edmonton, who led the new study."

While LODGEPOLE pines area on Western North America is limited, they Jack soft pine trees on the eastern slope of the Rockies. Jack pines cross the boreal forest of North Canada, at the East Coast and down in the United States.

Long wind designs beetle in the Rocky Mountains of British Columbia record pine beetle outbreak, the Jack pines in Alberta, where they have now enforced, said Cullingham carried out.

Two factors can to slow down the bug progress to the East. The first is that Jack is pine in patchier as the continuous swaths of coastline on the West Coast. This can, offer rates such as Jack Pine some protection against a continental sweep, as host when compared to a lodgepole pine.

A second important factor is that so far research out there, that the northern route across Canada too cold in winter for the beetle to survive, although this barrier can be temporary, as climate warms.

"Currently the climatic conditions over much of northern boreal forest quite suitable for these population groups not", said Allan Carroll of the University of British Columbia, which was not part of the study. "We predictions entirely, that being in short order, good for mountain pine - certainly within the next 30 to 50 years beetles".

"I think this work is very important," said Jesse Logan, a former USDA Forest Service entomologist. "We this the hypothesis, and in fact a map shows the link of the lodgepole pine, Eastern U.S. Jack Pine by the boreal forest in our 2001 paper contain." "Unfortunately it seems that our forecasts are to be realized."

He agrees that if global warming of continue unabated, the cold barrier will disappear. A second important point mentioned it, which means "mountain pine beetle has established itself in a geographical region (and host) where it has occurred never."

"Overall, we can say that the mountain pine beetle is now a component of the pine forest East of the Rocky Mountains and extends to the East," Carroll said. "The rate is of this extension currently unknown."

"We start see dead pine trees where we have not seen dead pine trees before," he added.

Even if it takes a while to make the East Coast, the beetles can cause problems of its own dissemination through the boreal forest. The forest timber, Habitat and fresh water, and it offers sequester large amounts of carbon. This partially by vulnerable to massive forest fires, beetles of the region could have infestations, Carroll said.

The beetle makes its way to the entire continent-whether quickly or over several Jahrzehnte--there are more and poet is the pine in East Canada and the United States and warmer climates in the South, have more conveniently for the extension.

"I think it is inevitable," said Carroll. "Whether it I don't know, but certainly now it is happening in my life, managed, the barrier to overcome, which had the Rocky Mountains, provided, I think, its movement to the East is inevitable."

Others are less sure. "I would exercise a little caution, which has obtained the mountain pine beetle over its hills and goes out to the Atlantic Ocean,", said Steven Seybold the USDA Forest Service and the University of California, Davis.

He suggests such a scenario would be that patches of pine much of the Prairies in the United States could already be the continent for the beetles have bridged probably.

At the same time, he said "if it in the East, founded get it would be a massive plague," he said. "It could get in a lot of pine trees in the East (types)". "You might think even it always in the South."

The beetle attacks mature trees only; ultimately, its larvae kill the tree by feeding on its bark. But these age-specific targeting means that species would probably not completely destroyed.

But current forest management practices, including holding down fire, often create forests of full trees of uniform age, who are particularly vulnerable. Careful monitoring and forest management practices is different ages create change could help Woods of the coming swarm weather researchers said.

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