Pine Beetles are spreading

A silent killer is making its way through Colorado forests.

And some of the most vulnerable areas in the state are right here in Southern Colorado.

It’s all because of a small insect making a big impact.

Colorado has thousands of acres of majestic pine forest.

But those forests are facing serious threats. Some are very large, like wildfire. Others are very small. Like the pine beetle.

“The mountain pine beetle, in general, statewide, is the most devastating insect we have,” said Dave Carpenter from Tall Timbers Tree and Shrub Service.

The beet;e is about the size of a grain of rice, but it’s impact has been so much larger.

Carpenter said, “hundreds of thousands of acres have been lost because of the pine beetle.”

And in the last few years, it’s made its way out of the mountains and towards the cities.

“They’ve actually been coming down and they’ve been down for quite some time,” said Carpenter.

If you’re on the west side of Colorado Springs you may notice some trees that don’t look so healthy.

The discolored pine needles are one way to see if a tree is unhealthy, but it doesn’t always indicate a diseased tree. To find that, you need to look at the trunk.

Carpenter said, “if you see these little popcorn masses on the ponderosa pine (or) lodgepole pine, there’s been insect activity in there.”

And thanks to the persistent Colorado winds, the beetles can spread a long way from the original host tree.

As much as 500 feet, according to Carpenter.

That means that stopping the pine beetle will be a difficult task. But with a keen eye homeowners can do their part to keep Colorado forest as majestic as ever.

At the beginning of 2013, a Colorado Forest Service survey found that more than 250,000 acres of trees had been destroyed by the pine beetle in the latest infestation.