Bugs may be the death of us, but science can help

By: Judie Steeves, Kelowna Capital News :: Thursday Jun 6, 2009

As a kid, I used to go out into the meadow adjacent to our house with a jar and lid to catch the bees that droned constantly in the summer sun as they buzzed from flower to flower.

I’m sorry to say I usually let them die, although that wasn’t my intent. I’d line up jars of them along a 2x4 in the woodshed where I watched them trying to get free, fascinated by their wings and their fuzzy bodies—and by being able to study them without getting stung.

The occasional ladybug became part of my juvenile entomological experiment and I remember some June beetles and a daddy long legs.

Later, I did find it fascinating to dissect frogs in biology.

When I started out in the newspaper business I found myself writing about balsam woolly aphids and mosquito larva, as well as car accidents and murderers.

More recently, I expanded into writing about codling moths, peach tree borer, cherry fruit flies and bees.

I wrote a 10-part series for the Capital News in 1995 called Pest Aside, detailing integrated pest management techniques for controlling pesky household pests such as carpet beetles, fruit flies, silverfish, ants, pillbugs, spiders and earwigs; yellowjackets; fleas; aphids; cutworms and caterpillars.

Perhaps that was why one of my colleagues presented me with a bug writer of the year award at the Christmas party.

Termites, spruce budworm, bee mites, tussock moth, wood ticks and then mountain pine beetles captured my attention.

I’ve probably written millions of words about pine beetles, and I’m not finished. However, it’s only now that the leading edge of a province-wide infestation of mountain pine beetle—a tiny insect that has virtually wiped out that species of tree in the interior—is knocking at our door.

Some have already slipped in around the cracks, but we ain’t seen nothin’ yet. If you’ve been to Kamloops or the Cariboo recently, you’ll know what I mean.

So, the big question that’s being bandied about in scientific circles, is what to do to protect barren hillsides in our watersheds once the little bug has done its work.

They will kill the mature trees that provide a canopy to help snow melt slowly in spring; that shade creeks and the margins of lakes so water doesn’t become too warm for the aquatic creatures that inhabit it; and whose roots hold the soil in place so rainfall doesn’t gather it up and fling it into downstream water intakes.

Should we log those watersheds to salvage some timber and then replant or should we leave the trees to die and fall naturally to the forest floor where they’ll rot and return to the earth?

Should we knock down trees as they die, to prevent a forest fire from roaring through, taking all that’s in its path, or do we leave them and instead increase our education about the danger of sparks in tinder-dry environments?

Do we employ techniques to stabilize watershed soils to protect water quality or just filter that water once it flows into our water treatment plants, so people can drink it safely?

Can we treat all watersheds the same or will the impacts be different in each one?

The questions have gone far beyond “How can we stop this insect?” to “How will we deal with the hand it’s dealt us?” It’s an important question and we must rely on proven science for our answer.