United States Department of Agriculture
U.S. Forest Service
Pacific Northwest Research Station
General Technical Report PNW-GTR-259, June 1990
This history records the first large-scale bark beetle control project in a National Park in the Pacific Northwest. It describes the relations between Park Service, Forest Service, and USDA Bureau of Entomology personnel; how the project was organized; the ecological implications of the outbreak; and the long-term results of direct control measures.
Introduction
Keywords: Bark beetles, Crater Lake National Park, control, Bureau of Entomology, Forest Service, insect outbreaks.
The tide of the control battle has ebbed and flowed. The control forces have given the enemy repeated setbacks, but until recently the beetles on the southern front have had their forces strengthened by reinforcements from the north. The northern reserves are now depleted, and the remnants of the beetle army are widely dispersed and rendered ineffective with only a few concentrated groups operating in territory outside the former battlefields. The ultimate victory is now in sight. 1
If this sounds like war, it was. The protection of the lodgepole pine (Pinus contorta Dougl. ex Loud.) forests of Crater Lake National Park from destruction by the mountain pine beetle (Dendroctonus ponderosae) has engaged the attention of the National Park Service and the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service and Bureau of Entomology, since 1925, and despite Entomologist F.P. Keen's optimism in 1930, the war was far from over.
Let us go back a few years and see how this quasi-war of man against beetles began and why so much effort and money was expended to win the "ultimate victory." In 1923, the Superintendent of Crater Lake National Park requested help from the Bureau of Entomology because groups of lodgepole pine in the northern portion of the park were being killed by the mountain pine beetle. Because the dominant tree within the park was lodgepole pine, Park Superintendent Colonel C.G. Thomson visualized the park would become a "windblown, sandy desert without the lodgepole pines."2 During that summer, John E. Patterson responded for the Bureau from its Ashland, Oregon, field station and made a first examination of the outbreak. Because the Park Service had no funding for insect control in 1924, plans were made to do a more extensive survey in summer 1924 and to request funds to start control operations in 1925.
The epidemic apparently started 10 years earlier in National Forest stands northeast of the park near Diamond Lake and spread slowly southward killing from 50 to 90 percent of the stand as it progressed.3
In the National Parks, the commercial value of a tree species was irrelevant. Trees provided cover and scenic back drop and the policy at that time was to protect them from fire or insects at almost all costs. As we shall see later in the story, it was a losing battle. And though the beetles essentially won the war, the lessons learned helped bring on a more ecologically enlightened management style decades later.
The purpose of this story is to point out how foresters, land managers, and entomologists reacted to an insect outbreak in Crater Lake National Park during the early 1900s, the lessons they learned, the development of new technology, and how lessons from the past have helped to shape our current pest management policies. Neither the Forest Service nor the Park Service changed or curtailed their bark beetle control policies overnight. The changes took many years and came about after many experiences similar to the one chronicled here.
Crater Lake was not the only National Park with insect problems. Several others also requested funds to control insects at the time, but the situation at Crater Lake may have been the most serious because of the importance of lodgepole pine as forest cover and the intensity and magnitude of the beetle outbreak. Therefore in late July 1924, Patterson, F.P. Keen, J.M. Miller, and F.C. Craighead of the Bureau of Entomology made a survey of the beetle outbreak. In a report to H.C. Albright, National Park Service Director, Patterson pointed out the gravity of the situation (see footnote 3) and requested $5,000 to start the campaign. It so happened that in 1925 the emergency bill for the U.S. Department of the Interior provided $25,000 for the suppression of insect epidemics in National Parks. This was the first specific appropriation for insect control work in National Parks, and Crater Lake got its share.4
The control project in that first year needs to be described in some detail because it set a pattern for future events.5 To do that, a little must also be known about the technical leader of the project Assistant Entomologist, John E. Patterson, from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Bureau of Entomology, field station in Ashland, Oregon. John Patterson joined the Bureau of Entomology, Division of Forest Insect Investigations, at its Ashland field station in 1914. Before transferring to the Bureau of Entomology as an entomological ranger, he was a guard at Crater National Forest. He had a varied career earner as a photographer, surveyor's helper, railroad signal installer, and salesman of packing house products. He was a well-liked and highly competent self-taught entomologist. He published papers on several bark beetle and insect defoliator problems. He was in charge of the Ashland field station from 1921 to 1924 and served as assistant station leader of the Bureau of Entomology's Berkeley laboratory during the last 8 years of his career. He retired in July 1950 and died on July 31, 1962, in Ashland (see footnote 6).
Activities in 1925 -- The First Year
In the 1924 survey report, Patterson recommended that the large, intense outbreak north of the lake be ignored. He pointed out that almost 80 percent of the trees had already been killed so efforts to protect stands from future losses should be centered south of the lake in the following areas: south of Wheeler Creek near the east entrance, between Sand and Wheeler Creeks, in the Pinnacles, south of Wheeler between Lost Creek Ranger Station and Kerr Notch, in Munson Valley, and in Anna Springs.7 These areas totaled about 1,920 acres (see footnote 3). Control crews moved into the park on May 25,1925. The first camp was established at the Ranger Station at the east entrance (no longer in existence). It was difficult to move the crews and equipment into this area because of late persistence of snow 3 to 6 feet deep. Consequently the first few days were spent opening the roads so that trucks could bring in the crews and supplies. Camps were later established at the Lost Creek Ranger Station on May 27 and at Government Camp near Munson Valley on June 24. Control work was completed by July 11 with 4,291 trees treated. Average diameter at breast height of the treated trees was 14 inches (see footnote 5).
Treatment methods were similar to those used in the mountain pine beetle control project in northeastern Oregon in 1911.8. But some new wrinkles had resulted from some experimental work by Patterson. He described the methods in his report as follows:
All infested trees were felled before being treated. The smaller trees were felled with axes while those above 8 inches in diameter were felled with saws. In the control work on areas A, B, C, D, and E, the felled trees were limbed and the tops and branches piled back on the infested logs and the whole mass was burned. This method was the cheapest one that could be employed to kill the broods of beetles and was used until the lateness of the season made the danger from fire too great to be risked. Consequently on areas F and G, which were treated after June 25th, burning was discontinued. On these areas the felled trees were limbed and topped and the stripped logs rolled to openings in the forest where the sun during the midday period shown directly on them. Owing to the thin bark of lodgepole pine an exposure to the sun under these conditions for a period of at least two hours resulted in bark temperatures sufficiently high to kill the broods of beetles in whatever stage of development. It was necessary to turn the logs after the beetles under the upper bark had been killed in order to expose the rest of the brood to the sun's rays. Although this necessitated covering the same ground twice the additional cost and time involved was much less than that which would have been necessary to guard against the fire hazard attendant upon the first method. The two methods were equally effective in treating the infested trees, but the cost per tree on this project was slightly greater for the sun treatment, except when the fire hazard increased the cost of burning. The sun treatment method is particularly desirable in stands where the burning method would cause damage by scorching adjacent standing timber (see footnote 5).
The sun-curing method of treating beetle-infested lodgepole pine was proposed after studies carried out by Patterson near Ashland in the early 1920s and was the first operational use of the method in a bark beetle control project.9.
The Park Service spent $4,954.15 of their $5,000.00 allotment. Wages represented $3,131.75 of the total with the rest going for provisions, equipment, and various supplies. Not a bad cost accounting considering the remote area, poor transportation, deep snow, and lack of roads.
After surveys were made in September 1925, Patterson reported that the results of the work were good for most of the units; Kerr Notch was the worst area with 200 newly infested trees. He stated that (see footnote 5),
while the results of this first year's control work were very successful in breaking the epidemic, this reinfestation will, unless removed, soon again become epidemic. To prevent this and secure permanent results from the work already done the following recommendations should be carried out in the spring of 1926.
Thus began a series of rosy proclamations about winning the war against the beetles. The recommendations suggested that about 500 to 700 infested trees would be found the next spring and $1,000 would be needed to treat them. Some infestation of western pine beetle (Dendroctonus brevicomis) in large ponderosa pines (Pinus ponderosa Dougl. ex Laws.) near the south entrance were also noted with a recommendation to treat about 200 trees at a cost of $1,000. Thus, for a measly $2,000 Patterson stated, "The proposed work should not only maintain the beneficial results of the initial control work, but also should accomplish the practical elimination of all infestations in the south half of the Park" (see footnote 5). Did it? Let us follow the course of the battle.
Events From 1926 Through 1928
In February 1926, Park Superintendent Thomson wrote a disturbing letter to Patterson. The letter acknowledged the recommendation for $2,000 needed for spring 1926 control work but said that the funds could not be released until after July 1, 1926 (the new fiscal year). The letter ended, "...if it should be too late then to undertake effective control measures, the money will be available for use the following spring (1927) when insect infestations can be treated in time."10 Patterson replied immediately that he was perplexed over this delay in allotting funds that he thought were arranged. He saw much good work of 1925 going for naught if the remaining infestations could not be cleaned out in spring 1926 before beetles emerged from infested trees. In the meantime F.C. Craighead, Chief of Forest Insect Investigations, Bureau of Entomology, Washington, DC, started lobbying the top echelons of the Federal bureaucracy. He came up with $1,600 that was intended for Grand Canyon National Park (see footnote 10). This, combined with $400 left over from other work at Crater Lake, was enough to proceed as planned. New problems arose, however, once the control work started. Instead of several hundred infested trees as estimated in 1925, there were several thousand. This necessitated control work into August and September at Anna Creek and Munson Valley (see footnote 10). This was not good news because it meant treating well into the period when beetles were in flight and making new attacks. Spotters could miss many new attacks. The only good news was that the Park Service allotted $8,000 to Crater Lake for fiscal year 1927, minus the $1,600 hijacked from Grand Canyon. But, in the fall when Patterson and Thomson tried to find out exactly how much they had remaining to use in their spring 1927 work, they found the dollars had been slipping away to other parks -- Yellowstone for one (see footnote 10). The year-end report by Patterson showed 6,805 trees treated (43 were ponderosa pine infested with western pine beetle) at a cost of $9,645.16.11 He claimed a reduction of 86 percent in the number of infested trees on all the old units worked in 1925, but new infestations kept cropping up in fall 1926. An area around Crater Peak had 2,500 newly infested trees, and an area east of the entrance in the Crater National Forest continued to be a trouble spot. Patterson claimed that they continued as a source of new infestation for the lodgepole pine stands in the park. Patterson further surmised that the newly infested area at Crater Peak and the trees found in Munson Valley resulted from beetle infestations north of the lake. He felt that this source would no longer be troublesome because most of the trees in that area were dead by 1926 (see footnote 11). He optimistically requested only $2,500 to $3,000 for control work in 1927. Patterson was concerned about the reinvasion of areas in 1926, but after examining the old infestations north of the lake he was convinced (see footnote 11)
...that the progress or "drift" of the annual infestations had been consistently in a south-westerly direction. This fact was further supported by examination made in the new infested lodgepole stands in the west-central part of the Park. These stands have only recently been invaded and the drift of the beetles infesting them has also been toward the southwest. This is shown by the fact that the first trees attacked are on the northeast exposure of the infested areas.The discovery of this drift in the Crater Lake Park was of significance, because the control areas and the lodgepole pine stands in the west-central part just described, are in its path. Further evidence supporting this suspected cause of the re-infestation was the fact that the last trees attacked in the old areas north-east of the lake are located on their southwestern border and that these places represent the last stand of the beetles in this locality. These old areas were abandoned in 1926, because all the lodgepole in them had been killed. The flight of 1926 represented the last remnant of their beetle population and this remnant was forced to migrate to living stands of lodgepole. One of the last epidemic centers in these old areas abandoned by the beetles in 1926 is located on the rim or the lake near Round Top, (see map). This point is directly north-east of the Munson Valley region where the greatest re-infestation of the control areas occurred in 1926. This re-infestation is believed to have been caused by an invasion of beetles migrating from these old epidemic centers.
Another factor which probably contributed to this movement of beetles into Munson Valley was the burning day and night, during the flight period of 1925, of slash along the new rim road which was under construction from Government Camp to the Lodge at the north end of Munson Valley. It is well known that the mountain pine beetle is readily attracted to burning slash. The map shows the relative location of all the infested areas above discussed. The red arrows are drawn on the map to show the direction of the migration of the beetles. Control areas F, H, and 1, are the only areas in direct line with this suspected drift. It seems the above evidence is sufficiently conclusive to warrant The statement that the 1926 re-infestation of the control areas F, H, and 1, was caused by beetles migrating from the old-standing infestations north-east of the lake.
That there is no great hazard of such migration and consequent reinfestation of the areas south of the lake again occurring seems assured because there are not enough beetles now remaining in these old areas to make it possible. The 1925 flight represented practically the total beetle population of the region north-east of the lake.
Another budget crisis occurred in October 1926. A letter from Acting National Park Service Director Arno Cammerer to Superintendent Thomson on October 12, 1926, indicates a battle of the budgets as well as the bugs. Cammerer acknowledges a request from J.E. Patterson for an allotment of at least $2,500 to carry on a beetle project in the park in 1927 but states that there was only $500 held in reserve for 1927, and it was promised to Glacier National Park. He further said that the Park Service had requested $15,000 for insect control work in 1928, but this had been cut by the Bureau of the Budget to $7,500 and, because he understood from correspondence that the control work in Crater Lake had been "pretty well completed," they allotted only $500 to Crater Lake. He concluded by saying, "I see no possibility of providing you with additional funds as requested for work next spring."12
Patterson did not protest and probably assumed that Craighead in Washington, DC, would come through again and prevent Yellowstone from gaining all the funding.
My correspondence files are empty, unfortunately, for 1927 and 1928 so I do not know how the funding was arranged. But a control project was conducted in 1927: 2,936 lodgepole pine trees were treated at a cost of $2,500. The most remarkable thing was that the outbreak was apparently whipped, or at least stalled, because no control work was recommended for 1928.13
One interesting innovation occurred in the annals of beetle control work in 1927. Because of deep snow at Anna Creek, men and camps were transported successfully by tractors towing sleds. Also in 1927, the adjacent Crater National Forest treated 4,000 trees on the east edge of the park in a show of cooperation; Patterson felt there was little threat from that source in the future (see footnote 13). He did recommend that the Forest Service clean up some small infestations near Sand Creek in 1928. There was one disquieting note in the 1927 report:
Following the control work of 1927 only 545 infested trees have developed on the control areas. These trees represent the total beetle infestation at the present time. The future infestation on the control areas will depend upon the development of these 545 broods. It is not probable that they can soon increase to a point that will again menace the present stands (see footnote 13).
This seems like a risky statement given the history of the outbreak to this time.