I apparently have a lot of misconceptions about pine beetle effects on our forests. For years, I thought that the pine beetle outbreak from Tweedsmeuir park has been a contributor to the rate at which forest fires occur, and the distance in which they cover. Dr. Phil Burton, and ecosystem management researcher from UNBC has set me straight. Based on the small sample of forests he has compared he has a hunch that beetle killed for forests are at least slightly more likely to catch a blaze, however they have no effect on the distance covered by a fire. The effects of beetle kill are not significantly more powerful than weather patterns, or other possible contributing factors to forest fires.

It’s hard to gauge how charismatic a professional academic is, and how good their presentations will be, but Dr. Burton delivered on his remote presentation from Terrace BC. It’s true that there were some technical difficulties with his slides during the presentation, and the speakers were set just a little low, but Phil delivered on content and made it very approachable for a student from outside his field. Phil started off by explaining the terms that may not have had the same meaning between faculties and individuals. He also does a great job at talking over picture slides with no written information. These are skills that I hope to master and incorporate into my presentation abilities later on. The presenter today was very comfortable and confident in answering questions. The only questions he had received were requests to restate or clarify statements he had already made. Typically, when few questions are asked, it means that either the presenter was too long, too confusing, or presented the material in a logical fashion that everyone could follow. I believe that Dr.Burton was the later, and overall very enjoyable.

A quick summary of Dr. Burton’s presentation is that forests change based on stress, and that some forests resist cahnge better than others. Leafy, and dense bark trees contribute to fire suppression, while genetic and biological diversity contribute to the ability a forest has to recover from a deforestation event. There isn’t any apparent overlap with my current master’s thesis, but even still, my interest is peaked.  Without even noticing it (or at least addressing it) his presentation seemed to reflect the development of a forest, as much as the maintaining or recovery of a forest. A forest might exist in a given state, but with the right forces, nutrients, species, pressures or lack there of, a forest could change dramatically. The same way that skin cells can be worked back  and reassigned as embryonic cells, it almost seems like Dr. Burton’s work could lead to the reassignment of a forest. If you were to introduce more of a specific plant, the associated insects, birds, predators ect that live around it would increase as well, then decrease those that avoid it. This idea is too large for one blog post, but I will be continuing this thought during later days.