Tree munching beetle heats up debate: Halifax

Trevor Burton of Asplundh Tree Services cuts up a diseased red spruce tree at Shubie Park in Dartmouth recently. (Peter Parsons / Herald Photo)

For Bill Freedman, the brown spruce longhorn beetles munching Point Pleasant Park's red spruce trees are an "ecological catastrophe" waiting to happen.

"(They represent) a clear and present danger to the boreal forests of Canada," says the Dalhousie University scientist, who sits on a task force that has ordered up to 10,000 trees in the Halifax park be cut down beginning today.

But environmentalist Jim Drescher says the task force is giving in to panic generated by the forest industry.

"Industry is always freaked out about beetles," says Mr. Drescher, who is director of the Maritime Ecoforestry School near Bridgewater.

Mr. Drescher, who does not sit on the task force, has a master's degree in ecology.

He says cutting is futile because the spruce longhorn beetle, known to scientists as Tetropium fuscum, cannot survive in healthy living spruce and is very similar to the native spruce bark beetle.

Longhorn beetle eggs drown in the resin flowing through the outer sapwood of living trees.

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency that heads the task force has been putting its energy into trying to contain the brown spruce longhorn beetle. Instead, the agency should work on preventing new foreign species from getting into Nova Scotia woods, since they're not a threat to healthy trees, Mr. Drescher says.

Opponents of the planned cut argue that the infestation at Point Pleasant Park was sparked by stress on the trees from heavy foot traffic and the removal of nutrient-rich deadfalls.

"The likelihood that T. fuscum would develop outbreak levels that cause extensive mortality in healthy merchantable conifer stock is likely low," states a May 24 food inspection agency draft report.

Despite the report, the task force intends to eradicate the foreign beetle by cutting infested trees, burning the bark and salvaging whatever wood can be saved to offset the cost of the plan.

The beetle has been spotted at more than 50 locations outside the park. Cutting has already begun at some sites.

Meanwhile, the food inspection agency is distributing posters with bold red lettering saying Attention: This Foreign Insect Kills Spruce Trees. The posters include an insect hotline, 1-877-868-0662, for those who think they have seen brown spruce longhorn beetles.

Mr. Drescher says the task force membership is skewed toward those who favour the forest industry's agenda.

The 28-member group comes under the federal Department of Agriculture and Agri-food. It is mostly made up of civil servants - federal and provincial employees of the food inspection agency, the Canadian Forest Service, Parks Canada and the Nova Scotia Department of Natural Resources.

The group also includes two entomologists and four employees of the municipal department of parks and natural services.

Iain Taylor of Friends of Point Pleasant Park agrees that there are holes in the task force membership.

"It's a personal disappointment that, for example, the federal Environment Department is not represented," Mr. Taylor says.

He would like to see a study done on endangered species in Point Pleasant Park before cutting begins.

Halifax regional Coun. Sheila Fougere has faith in the scientific grounding of the task force.

"I think they are proceeding with relative caution," she says.

David McCorquodale, an entomologist at the University College of Cape Breton and an expert on North American Tetropium beetles, stands by Eric Georgeson, the provincial entomologist on the task force.

"Georgeson's not the sort of guy that's going to back down and make a decision based on intimidation," Mr. McCorquodale says.

Michelle Zurbrigg of Halifax is a journalism student at Ryerson Polytechnic University in Toronto