Damage and Management of The Spruce Bark Beetle

(Ips typographus) in The Eastern Black Sea Region of Turkey

Temel GÖKTÜRK¹               Yaşar AKSU²

¹Faculty of Forestry, Artvin Coruh University, Artvin, Turkey

²Artvin Forest Department, Forest Protection, Artvin, Turkey.

Spruce and other coniferous hosts are widely present in natural forests in the eastern Blak Sea Region of Turkey. Oriental spruce (Picea orientalis) is one of the main timber species and covers about 350.000 hectar in Turkey. These forests were affected from bark beetles in two decades. There are some 6.000 species of bark betle worldwide with over 200 species in Turkey. The spruce bark betle Ips typographus L. (Coleoptera: Curculionidae) is one of the most important spruce forest pest in the eastern Black Sea Region of Turkey. Ips typographus gets on spruce forests by following the distribution ways of Dendroctonus micans from Georgian Forest by the year 1980. It induced dies of stands by distribute all over the spruce forests and increased its populations from the year of 1998. The spruce bark betle was first recorded in Artvin Rrovince in 1984. Since then, it has spread to all over the oriental spruce forests in Eastern Black sea region of Turkey. Damage and mortality caused by spruce bark betle has increased dramatically over the last 20 years as a result of a number of factors such as global warming, air pollution, and the use of non local seed sources which have resulted in a dramatic increase in spruce bark betle populations. In 1999-2001 two outbreaks of I.typographus have occurred in Turkey resulting in 1 million m³ of killed oriental spruce. All these outbreaks were initiated by storm fallings providing large amounts of wind-thrown trees as breeding material.

            Various methods have been used to control this pest, including pheromone traps, trap trees, natural enemies and mechanical control strategies. During the years 1998 to 2012 more than 386.343.053 adults of Ips typographus were trapped into 136.422 traps in forests of Artvin. Newadays environmentalism is getting more popular hence latest studies have focused on using natural enemies in biological control. During the years 2006 to 2012, the 45.986 number of Thanasimus formicarius were grown in biological control laboratory of Artvin.

            Ecological balance with Ips typographus has provided nearly all over the forests by biotechnical, mechanic and biological control efforts which were done up to 2012 in Artvin. But damage of I.typographus is continues in other city of the eastern Black Sea Region of Turkey. Management of I.typographus; The aim of managing bark beetles is to minimize attacks on living trees. Multi-tree species forests are often less susceptible to bark betle attack. Prevention of bark betle damage by clean harvesting, elimination of breeding places, Using pheromone traps and trap trees, Using of natural enemies, especially protect of woodpeckers and grown of Thanasimus formicarius. The successful control of Ips typograhnus is to reach the betle in all stages of its development in principle all methods should be used together as an integrated system.

Yayın yeri: Göktürk,T.; Aksu,Y.; Damage and Management of The Spruce Bark Beetle (Ips typographus) in The Eastern Black Sea Region of Turkey. Internatıonal Scıentıfıc-Practıcal Conference, Current Challenges of Sustainable Forest Management in Caucasus. Book of Abstracts sayfa 24. Agrıcultural Unıversıty of Georgia 07-08 October 2013 Tblisi.