The pine beetles may be with us a few more years say entomologists who study the insects that have invaded the Black Hills National Forest over the last decade. Because of that, the beetles may kill more of the standing timber in the Black Hills. Thinning operations have slowed the advance of the beetles in some areas, but the key factor will be the length of time it takes the trees to recover from the eight-year drought that ended two years ago. Entomologists say it can take trees many years to recover from drought and there are a lot of bugs. Kurt Allen says, "What I've seen this fall and winter; there's still an increasing population out there. They're doing very well. The trees were under a lot of drought stress, and usually it does take two or three years of good solid moisture for those things to come back."

The Black Hills National Forest isn't alone in the pine beetle outbreak. The beetles have invaded most of the other Nationals Forests in the west as well.

Al Van Zee