Ideas, Speakers & Lectures

Wilderness Workshop

Wilderness Workshop’s mission is to protect the wilderness, water, and wildlife of western Colorado’s public lands. The organization works across more than four million acres of public lands to ensure their ecological integrity. They have led efforts to designate more than half a million acres of Wilderness and hundreds of thousands of roadless areas in western Colorado. Their efforts focus on protecting public lands from threats such as industrial development, climate change, and short-term exploitation, but perhaps more important is what they protect public lands for – intact and thriving ecosystems, a livable planet for current and future generations, and the moment of awe that can only be experienced in a wild place. Learn more at wildernessworkshop.org.

Naturalist Nights: Forest Disturbance by Bark Beetle in Colorado with Dan West

Aspen Public Radio

Published July 26, 2022 at 1:57 PM MDT

This event was recorded on February 10, 2022 as part of the 2022 Winter Naturalist Nights Series, in partnership with Aspen Public Radio.

Dr. Dan West discusses Colorado’s major bark beetle species and a recent history of beetle epidemic locations shown from an Aerial Detection Survey. Did you know that weather plays a crucial role in insect and disease activity in Colorado’s forests?

As temperature and precipitation regimes change, so do the defenses in trees. Bark beetle response to tree defenses, or lack thereof, is directly related to temperature and precipitation regimes.

Each winter, Wilderness Workshop, the Aspen Center for Environmental Studies (ACES), and Roaring Fork Audubon partner to co-host the popular Naturalist Nights speaker series; nature specialists from around the country were invited to talk about their studies for a special opportunity to inform the public on the nature around us, and give insight into the science that can potentially affect the way that we interact with our environment.

Dr. Dan West serves as the State’s Forest Entomologist with the Colorado State Forest Service: CSU. He works on all forested lands, focusing on state and private forests, providing educational opportunities on emerging pest issues and best practice treatment options within the state. Dan conducts annual aerial surveys over 24 million forested areas of the state, researching emerging and ongoing forest disturbances. He also teaches at Colorado State University, and serves as a resource for insect-tree interactions. He received his Bachelor’s in Forestry and his Master’s and Doctorate in Entomology from Colorado State University.