Don Carroll, Deputy Forest Supervisor

Frisco, Colorado, July 6th, 2006----Don Carroll, Deputy Forest Supervisor for the White River National Forest and director of the Northern Colorado Bark Beetle Cooperative (NCBBC) was the guest presenter at a meeting this morning of the Summit County Pine Beetle Task Force.

 

The NCBBC was chartered to harness the energies of several state, county, and municipal organizations to assess the extent of the bark beetle infestation while encouraging the implementation of desired remedies over a fifteen county area in the northern Colorado mountain region. 

 

Since the cooperative published their “Strategy for Action and Assessment of the Bark Beetle Situation” in February, Carroll has been working with local organizations to encourage a coordinated response to the bark beetle infestation while increasing awareness of the need for a long-term landscape scale plan for forest succession.  

 

Ongoing fuels treatments and fire mitigation are also priorities, with emphasis on protecting residential areas and community infrastructure.  

 

“The condition of our forests has created a great habitat for the mountain pine beetle,” Carroll observed. “Spraying trees might help for a while, but the inevitable (tree mortality) will happen.”  

 

Carroll recommends that the forest that replaces our current beetle infested stands be managed through partnerships involving local government, community organizations and private industry. By implementing a integrated approach using the best available science, we can encourage new forest growth as well as establish one that can better withstand disease and insect infestation.

 

Also attending the meeting was Maggie McCaffrey, team leader for the Upper Colorado River Fire Prevention Team.  She is in the area to work with local fire officials on developing a fire prevention program template that will compliment existing Community Wildfire Protection Plans. Her emphasis will be on reducing the number of careless human instigated fire events. She advised that the Forest Service anticipates introducing fire  s into the regular pattern of forest management so local residents should be made aware about how that might be implemented.

 

Staffers from the offices of several members of Congress, including Senators Allard and Salazar as well as Representatives Beauprez and Udall, brought the task force up to speed on the latest bark beetle initiatives under consideration in Washington.

 

A combined Colorado congressional delegation will meet with representatives of local and regional government entities next week to craft a unified approach to existing policy and funding initiatives addressing our bark beetle threat and the increasing probability of catastrophic wildfires.

 

Trudy Kareus announced that Senator Salazar would be holding a meeting with representatives of the Summit County Pine Beetle Task Force on Friday to discuss the bark beetle problem and recommendations for preferred landscape outcomes.