Tiny bark beetles have been causing havoc in Germany's Harz mountains, eating away at trees and killing off swaths of the spruce population by hampering their ability to take in nutrients. Drought made longer and more intense by climate change is making the problem even worse, as beetles prefer the trees weakened by a lack of water and reproduce better in the warm and dry conditions. Forest conservationists know they have a problem, but there are no easy solutions. A mixture of good planning, chemical pesticides and a longer- term effort to plant different trees in the region are strategies to keep the beetles at bay. But with the climate warming up, it's unclear if conservationists will win their battle against the bugs.
CLAUSTHAL-ZELLERFELD, Germany (AP) — Nestled in the spruce trees in the Harz mountains of northern Germany is a bark-eating pest not much bigger than a sesame seed. Known as “book printers” for the lines they eat into the bark that fan out from a single spine resembling words on a page, these eight-toothed beetles have always been part of the local forest. Officials expect the bugs to typically kill a few spruces each summer as they find suitable trees to lay their eggs — they burrow into the tree’s cambium, or growing layer, hampering it from getting the nutrients it needs to survive.