Latvia is preparing to declare a new state of emergency. In recent years, the weather has been particularly favourable for the eight-toed spruce bark beetle, which poses a threat to forests, reported Latvian Television (LTV) on 8 February.
Many forest owners in Latvia have been in for a painful surprise: hectares of forest have literally been eaten. Weather conditions in Latvia over the past two years have been favourable for bark beetles, so their population has increased rapidly, but the extent of the damage caused has become much greater. A good environment for these insects comes after storms, with plenty of broken, damaged spruce trees in the forest, as well as dry and long summers when several generations of insects can shift in a single season.
"The situation has deteriorated dramatically over the last two years. And now it is very bad! The problems started in 2021, when there was a very long, hot summer and a long autumn when the second generation and the forecasts for the third generation came - a very rapid increase in the damage to the forest. The spring and summer of last year put an end to everything - very, very quickly, because of the climate," says Agnis Šmits, chief scientist at the Latvian State Forest Research Institute Silava.
In previous years, the destruction of bark was estimated at 550-850 hectares, but in 2022 it increased several times, damaging about 2,300 hectares of spruce forest, especially in Vidzeme and Sēlija.
In the light of these research data, the State Forest Service (VMD), together with the Ministry of Agriculture, the Nature Conservation Agency and other experts, discussed on Wednesday the intention to ask the government to declare a state of emergency for the forests in the threatened areas.
"The aim is to protect valuable spruce forests and limit the spread of the eight-toed spruce bark beetle," said Andis Purs, head of the VMD's Forest and Environmental Protection Department.
Bark beetles are attracted by the odour of freshly felled trees, so the main measure in the proposed emergency will be a ban on forestry in valuable spruce forests.
At the same time, the plan is to fell and remove the infested trees, which have just shown signs of bark invasion, and to set up pheromone traps to catch the insects. However, during the discussion, the representatives of the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency expressed concern that under the guise of this 'emergency', logging could also take place in protected natural areas.
It is urgent to control the spruce bark beetle, as it is also known to move to pine trees when the population becomes very large.
Already in 2020, a law on Gauja National Park was adopted for the effective control of the pest.
