New Mexico tree deaths increase in wake of 2022 wildfires
Apr. 27—The number of conifer trees dying in New Mexico's forests from bark beetle attacks more than doubled last year to 70,000 acres, especially near burn scars left by wildfires in 2022.
Bark beetles belong in New Mexico forests and usually attack and kill stressed trees. The native beetles can benefit a forest by thinning out diseased or overcrowded trees, making room for healthy young trees, or increasing the amount of sunlight reaching forest floors in crowded forests. But in some New Mexico forests, entire landscapes are stressed by long-term drought and burn scars from catastrophic wildfires.
Although the number of tree deaths in 2024 is alarming, it's a far cry from years like 2022, when close to 375,000 acres were affected by bark beetles, almost seven times the acreage affected in 2024, said Victor Lucero, forest health program coordinator with the New Mexico Forestry Division.
"Carson and Santa Fe (national forests), as well as the Gila, definitely saw a spike in insect activity, especially in those areas that did experience large wildfires in 2022," Lucero said.
The New Mexico Forest Health Conditions report is based on aerial surveys of 14 million acres of state, federal, tribal and private forests and woodlands. It is created by the New Mexico Forestry Division and the U.S. Forest Service.
Forests and woodlands with damages from insects and disease increased by 12% in 2024, while defoliation statewide increased by 39%.
There were a significant number of dead trees around the 2022 burn scars, according to the report, contributing to the bark beetle-caused increase in tree mortality. There isn't data on bark beetle tree deaths in those burn scars for 2023, because it's standard practice to wait two years before measuring insect-caused mortality after a wildfire, according to Lucero. The trees killed by fire make it impractical to attempt measuring insect damage immediately after a fire.
Higher temperatures and prolonged drought, which means not enough soil moisture for trees to compensate for hotter conditions, stress trees. Consecutive years of those stressors can trigger a large bark beetle attack.
"Timely moisture can remedy some of these conditions. Obviously, this past year in New Mexico, we had a horrible snowpack. What the models are saying is that we do have a pretty good chance of a pretty good monsoon season, which can be a game changer with respect to helping the forest and woodlands become more resilient to the effects of not just drought but also have the ability to naturally ward off insect pressure," Lucero said.
More moisture allows conifers to have a sustained sap flow — the trees' natural defense against bark beetles.
While temperatures were high in New Mexico last year — it was the second-warmest year on record — drought conditions improved from 2023. The forest acres impacted by drought and heat decreased 65% statewide, according to the report.
And while conifer deaths rose, piñon pine mortality declined by 56%.
"In the fall, there was definitely a huge cone crop in our piñon forest, and so there were a ton of piñon nuts," Lucero said.
Last year's tree deaths could mean more fuel on the ground for wildfires this year, Lucero said, which is why practices that remove fuel from the landscape are important to use on public and private land.
To encourage long-term forest health in the state, forest managers can also take a leaf out of the bark beetles' book by thinning overcrowded forests. An overstocked forest means more competition for moisture, sunlight and nutrients in soil.
"Many of the forests and woodlands really have too many trees per unit area. For many, many years, either the lack of low-intensity naturally occurring fires or the lack of prescribed fires in the right conditions have led to an overabundance of trees," Lucero said.
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