Geographical variability of sprucebark beetle development under climate change in the Czech Republic

Abstract

Climate change is expected to influence the distribution and population dynamics of many insect pests, with potential severe impacts on forests. Spruce bark beetle Ips typographus (L.) (Col.: Curculionidae, Scolytinae) is the most important forest insect pest in Europe whose development is strictly regulated by air temperature. Therefore, climate change is anticipated to induce changes in the pest's distribution and development. We used the PHENIPS model to evaluate climate change impacts on the distribution and voltinism of spruce bark beetle in the Czech Republic. Two future time periods -2025-2050 (near future) and 2075-2100 (distant future) -are addressed. The period 1961-1990 is used as the reference. We found that while a two-generation regime dominated in the Czech Republic in the reference period, significant three-generation regime regions are projected to appear in the near future. In the distant future, the three-generation regime can be expected to occur over all existing coniferous stands in the Czech Republic. The analysis of altitudinal shift of n-generation regime regions indicates noticeable expansion of Ips typographus development to higher elevations, leading for example to disappearance of one-generation regime regions in the distant future. Uncertainties and limitations of the presented findings are discussed as well.

Climate change impacts on growth and carbon ­balance of forests in Central Europe

“…Climate change is not expected to negatively affect the receding edge of oak forests in Central Europe provided that resident pests and pathogens (e.g. defoliators such as Lymantria dispar L. or tracheomicotic fungi such as species of Ceratocystis and Ophiostoma) do not increase their outbreak ranges (Hlásny & Turčáni 2009) and virulence, and provided that newly emerging species (Bolte et al 2009) do not substantially alter the present forest disturbance regime.…”

“…Production of the remaining spruce stands was projected to re main more or less equal to that in the reference period. Spruce growth and survival at these elevations, however, could be threatened by future development of a 3rd generation of the spruce bark beetle (Ips typographus) (Hlásny et al 2011), as well as by increasing drought stress that would enhance spruce susceptibility to secondary agents (Dutilleul et al 2000). Thus, spruce is not expected to be sustained there.…”

Development of a method for monitoring of insect induced forest defoliation – limitation of MODIS data in Fennoscandian forest landscapes

“…Insect populations may experience increased survival, development, reproduction, and dispersal rates due to increasing temperatures (Logan et al 2003;Lindner et al 2010). A number of forest insects have already begun to expand their normal ranges of distribution (Vanhanen et al 2007;Jepsen et al 2008;Hlásny et al 2011), or change their status into disturbance agents within their original distributions (De Somviele et al 2007). Hence, mapping and monitoring of insect outbreaks is a highly important topic that calls for development of cost-efficient technologies, such as satellite based remote sensing applications (Lyytikäinen-Saarenmaa et al 2008;Kantola et al 2010).…”

Classification of Needle Loss of Individual Scots Pine Trees by Means of Airborne Laser Scanning

“…Due to rapid responses to elevating temperatures, pest insects can flexibly change their survival, development, reproduction, dispersal and geographic distribution [13][14][15][16]. Increasing numbers of pest insects have already begun to expand their normal geographic ranges, either pole-ward latitudinally or upward altitudinally [17][18][19], or change their pest status within their ranges [20]. Increased outbreak frequencies and spatial scales of forest pests evidently have already undergone changes during the most recent decade in Finland, particularly with pine sawflies [20].…”