UNB team getting the bugs out

Highlighting a significant research project under the tutelage of Dr. Dan Quiring is a daunting task. That’s due, in large part, because the University of New Brunswick’s Faculty of Forestry & Environmental Management professor, and his team, have between 8 to 10 active studies in the queue—and some are already paying dividends by saving the forest industry significant time and money. More importantly, their research is revolutionizing the approach to pest population control in our forests.

Quiring, a population ecology entomologist, and his team focus part of their research on studying and evaluating the basic ecology of pest populations, then apply this science to satisfy a variety of mandates. From the accumulated research, the team gains the ability to develop sampling techniques, green suppression approaches (biological controls) and explore preemptive silviculture approaches, all with the goal of reducing the chance pest populations will explode to intolerable levels.

And the research approaches and remedies are as diverse as the myriad of insects that call a tree home. One ongoing effort involves integrating insect resistance into tree breeding programs.  

First, there is work underway to develop insect resistance for both black and white spruce, which are susceptible to invading populations of spruce bud moth, yellowheaded spruce sawfly and several other pests. The white pine weevil and balsam wooly adelgid haven’t gone unnoticed either. The latter of the two is particularly damaging for New Brunswick Christmas tree growers, whose exports are a vital part of a robust forest industry.

In 2009 a significant financial investment was announced for silviculture activities in New Brunswick, and the commonly used silviculture practice of thinning stands is inspiring further research by the team. Understanding insect dynamics and damage before and after thinning applications can greatly improve efficiencies for both the industry and private woodlot owners. 

The ongoing research undertaken at the University of New Brunswick has already had a significant impact for the Newfoundland and Labrador forest industry. In western Newfoundland forests are constantly threatened with defoliating insect outbreaks, costing millions of dollars in damage. In severe outbreaks, insects will kill as many trees as are harvested for production.

Enter Dr. Dan Quiring and the research unit at the University of New Brunswick, Dr. Eric Bauce, a scientist at the Université Laval and Drs. Lucie Royer, Johanne Deisle and Christian Hébert from the Canadian Forest Service. Through their collaborative efforts and a three-year study on the hemlock looper (a caterpillar defoliator) that was funded by industry and the National Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), it was discovered that the life cycle of the looper can be interrupted in the spring, when their eggs are vulnerable to parasitism.  

Both the hemlock looper and the infamous spruce budworm are being held in check with aerial spraying of Bacillus thuringiensisi (Bt). The team’s research results allowed forest managers to fine tune and target their application efforts with pinpoint accuracy in problem areas, avoiding unnecessary and costly broad based applications.  

Hubert Crummey, an entomologist with the provincial Forest Insect Control Program in Newfoundland, summarizes the study results, “… the findings of Quiring’s team have allowed for better assessment of potential infestations for the following season.” He believes it’s an easy trade-off—spending millions on a biological treatment or spending thousands to get “really good information from the university researchers.” 

– Barb Scott