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Message: <blockquote data-quote="locustella" data-source="post: 3377667" data-attributes="member: 26257">It is well known fact, that number of generations the bark beetles can produce depends on temperature, which increases from north to south, from higher to lower elevations in mountains, it is higher on southern slopes.Global warming (and drought) probably causes or could case outbreaks of these insects, sometimes enormous:<a href="http://www.climatehotmap.org/global-warming-locations/british-columbia-canada.html" target="_blank">http://www.climatehotmap.org/global-warming-locations/british-columbia-canada.html</a><a href="http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2012/03/climate-change-sends-beetles-overdrive" target="_blank">http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2012/03/climate-change-sends-beetles-overdrive</a><a href="http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/04/30/446908/global-warming-is-doubling-bark-beetle-mating-boosting-tree-attacks-up-to-60-fold-study-finds/" target="_blank">http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/04/30/446908/global-warming-is-doubling-bark-beetle-mating-boosting-tree-attacks-up-to-60-fold-study-finds/</a>(mountain pine beetle Dendroctonus ponderosae and mainly lodgepole pine Pinus contorta, British Columbia and Colorado)<a href="http://sciencenordic.com/effects-climate-change-spruce-bark-beetle" target="_blank">http://sciencenordic.com/effects-climate-change-spruce-bark-beetle</a><a href="https://translate.google.pl/translate?hl=en&sl=pl&u=http://tpn.pl/pl/pdf/1501&prev=search" target="_blank">https://translate.google.pl/translate?hl=en&sl=pl&u=http://tpn.pl/pl/pdf/1501&prev=search</a>(European spruce bark beetle Ips typographus and Norway spruce Picea abies)But perhaps the bark beetle is only the pretext to salvage more timber.Recent years were warm, some areas of the Białowieża Forest were drained by foresters in the first half of the twentieth century and maybe later, entire swamps dissappeared.The very important question is however, to interfere or not. This is hugely natural or almost natural forest and maybe we should allow the nature to do things, whatever is going to happen ? Even some areas are affected by humans and they need human intervention to protect from people (malformed forest plantations) ? Probably in the past such outbreaks similarly to fires were generating clearings where many animals could live and feed, like butterflies and raptors, I wouldn't be surprised. The spruce bark beetle are also the only food of the three-toed woodpecker, etc. This what is going on arises from the point of view of people earning money on selling the wood. But there is another point of view - to leave everything alone like thousands years ago and earlier, when forests were doing well without chain saws.I think that everything could be done in the extended national park, if really needed. But they don't want to extend the park. If it is caused by global warming, maybe the time of spruce expired at that geographical latitude and simply we should allow it to be replaced by clearings and later by another species of trees, not planted by people but "self sown" ones ? The area is small in comparison to forests covering entire ancient Europe like Hercynian forest  and maybe this is a little risky, similar to effect of the genetic drift in a way,  when the normally unlikely events are more likely to happen, but possible intervention could be done in frames of the future national park.In the past, when storms with 140-180 km/h winds completely destroyed forests in some areas of Tatra Mountains in Slovakia:<a href="http://assets.panda.org/downloads/wwfpositiontatrastorm.pdf" target="_blank">http://assets.panda.org/downloads/wwfpositiontatrastorm.pdf</a>(southern slopes of those mountains !) spruce pine beetle outbreak could and later had begun and it has been argued whether to interfere and remove so called dead wood or leave it alone like in a natural forest was going on before invention of the chain saw and ax.I don't believe information of the ministry of environment, they don't acknowledge such terms like natural or primeval forest, call everything "resources".</blockquote>

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