Notes:

Crews applying verbenone-impregnated flakes to help protect whitebark pine during bark beetle outbreaks. Photo courtesy of Nancy Gillette, USDA Forest Service.

Art Partridge summarized the direction that ecosystem managers should take.

"Described here are (so-called) 'disease' systems that are normal, integral parts of healthy forest ecosystems. They exist as components that recycle parts of stable communities. Only when disturbances upset these ecosystems do these root maladies become seriously destructive. Your function is to recognize when the balance is tilted and know how to prevent or remedy such imbalance. Remember that the same organisms that help kill trees also help return their biomass to the system and to release nutrients and build soil. Some are even food for other parts of the system."