Wildfire and Pine Beetles

  • Released Tuesday, September 7, 2010
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Mountain pine beetles are native to Western forests, but in recent years their numbers have skyrocketed. As they damage more trees and kill whole regions of forest, some worry that the dead forest left behind has become a tinderbox ready to burn. But do pine beetles really increase fire risk?Using Landsat satellite data, University of Wisconsin forest ecologist Phil Townsend and his team are discovering that pine beetle damage appears not to have a significant impact in the risk of large fires. In fact, it might even reduce fire risk in some instances.

In this short video, Townsend and his team hit the ground to study the issue in the forest near Yellowstone National Park. While pine beetles may not significantly impact fire risk, Townsend believes that climate change may be leading to an increase in both pine beetle numbers and the risk of fire.

For complete transcript, click here.

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NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center

This page was originally published on Tuesday, September 7, 2010.
This page was last updated on Wednesday, May 3, 2023 at 1:54 PM EDT.

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