A Conceptual and Mechanistic Approach to Understanding Interactions among Multiple Disturbance Agents: Compound Effects of Fire on Resource Availability to Bark Beetles

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Bark beetles are native insects that exert dramatic effects on forest ecosystems. These include contributions to basic ecosystem processes such as nutrient cycling and gap formation, impacts on biodiversity, and, at times, widespread mortality to millions of trees. The frequency and extent of intermittent bark beetle outbreaks appear to be influenced by several human impacts, including climate change, forest fragmentation, and various management policies. This research will use ground sampling, tree physiological and biochemical analyses, and satellite imagery to evaluate the effects of a major form of natural and human disturbance, fire, on susceptibility of lodgepole pine to the mountain pine beetle, and on mountain pine beetle reproduction. It also will test how fire injury affects reproduction by other, non tree-killing bark beetles that compete with mountain pine beetle. This work will contribute to our basic understanding of how disturbance agents interact in conifer forests, and provide useful information for resource managers. It will contribute to science infrastructure through the training of undergraduate students, graduate students, and postdoctoral associates. This interdisciplinary study will be conducted in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, where it will interface with other collaborators from various institutions.