Before the summer, many forest owners were worried that the spruce bark beetle would multiply and become a big problem, because it was feared that the warm and dry weather of spring would continue.
But that was not the case.
“The cooler weather here this summer and a lot of rainfall mean that you can probably breathe a sigh of relief for this season,” says Robert Sunesson, forest consultant at the Norwegian Forestry Agency, to the radio.
The spruce bark beetle swarms at temperatures around 17–18 degrees and then lays its eggs.
“If it’s still hot and dry then they swarm again and mass multiply five or six times as they did in 2018,” says Robert Sunesson.