Beetle Dung Helps Trees Recover From Fire

A Canadian scientist has determined beetle dung helps forests recover from wildfires.

Tyler Cobb, curator of invertebrate zoology at the Royal Alberta Museum, studied a northern Alberta area that was partially lost to wildfire during the summer of 2001.

By studying a certain species of beetles in burned and decaying trees he was able to determine the insects’ droppings play a vital role in replenishing soil nutrients that help plants regenerate.

He said the beetle droppings help nourish the forest floor by increasing microbial activity in the soil. That process can also determine which kinds of trees grow back.

This means that rather than being considered a pest or a nuisance, these beetles are in fact very important to helping burned forests recover, Cobb said.

But he also discovered salvage logging is removing the beetles’ eggs in dead trees, and the larvae are subsequently destroyed when the wood is processed at sawmills.

Cobb says salvage logging should be delayed after a fire to allow the beetles to complete their life cycle.

In theory, if you delayed logging for two years, these beetle populations could survive.