Bark beetles are still ravaging spruce trees across Southcentral Alaska. And although the beetles are running out of trees to target, the fire and fall risks the dead and dying trees pose are not going away any time soon.
The Kenai Peninsula Borough has identified about 21,000 impacted acres of borough land that it would like to address to preempt that risk. The Land Management Division is now crafting a plan to deal with that problem and turn trees into sellable timber.
This week, we spoke with land management officer Marcus Mueller and land management agent Dakota Truitt, from the borough, about that plan. Soldotna-based forester Mitch Michaud also joined us for some context and history on the spruce bark beetle problem.
You can read more about the plan and see the proposed timeline here.
