Attack of bark beetles in Rocky Mountains by Natalia Holvova

More than 1.5 million acres of lodgepole pines were destroyed in Colorado's Rocky Mountains by bark beetles lately and the infestation will probably continue. Bark beetles are parasitic insects usually living inside of rotten, droughty, dieing trees, which can help to destroy already sick trees in the forest. Sometimes they spread very fast and uncontrollably and get into health trees as well. Enormous spreading of bark beetles in health forest means catastrophe then. Infestation of bark beetles can be caused by global warming factors such as warm weather during the winter and very dry climate in the areas where the standard is wetness. Driving through the forest where half of trees are eaten from the inside and dieing right in front of you is very sad and you feel powerless and so small because insects even smaller than you are, are able to take all the beauty of the woods away and you can not find the way how to get rid of them. Laws of nature are much stronger than laws in human mankind society, because there are no rules no expectations no preventive measures we could use. When tornado comes or floods are going through the whole continent we can not just reverse this processes, we can only accept them and deal with the consequences. Officials in Colorado do not have power to kill the bark beetles but they can think about how to deal with the sickness of the forest, how to border the possibility of wider infestation in the Rocky Mountain and how to manage life after beetles are gone and forest is no more useful.

related story: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080114/ap_on_sc/bark_beetles;_ylt=AqSknKMcCI1o6E_yITNQGhes0NUE

by Natalia Holvova for PocketNews (http://pocketnews.tv)

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