Changing landscapes

Wildfires and pine beetle outbreaks are changing the landscape of Colorado forests, and the shift will likely result in fewer lodgepole pines and more aspen trees and subalpine fir.

But whether the shift will bring in more fire-resistant, drought-tolerant forests isn’t clear.

“We’re not seeing the forest replenishing itself with the same species, especially of lodgepole pine,” which has been hit hard by the beetle epidemic, said Teresa Chapman, a University of Colorado Boulder doctoral student who is doing research on forest regeneration and future forest predictions. “We are not seeing a lot of regeneration, either in the high elevations or in…