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Home Publications Climate Change / Assisted Migration Bark beetle outbreaks in western North America: Causes and consequences

Bark beetle outbreaks in western North America: Causes and consequences

Conference Proceedings
Justification

Western North America

Since 1990, native bark beetles have killed billions of trees across millions of acres of forest from Alaska to northern Mexico. Although bark beetle infestations are a regular force of natural change in forested ecosystems, several of the current outbreaks, which are occurring simultaneously across western North America, are the largest and most severe in recorded history.