Notes on Insects and Other Arthropods in Red and White Pine Logging Slash

Abstract

Logging slash constitutes an environment supporting a particular association of insects and other arthropods. At first, the species in the community are governed by the character of the slash, but with the passage of time the condition of the slash changes, the rate of change being directly affected by bark beetles and other wood borers that facilitate entry of wood-destroying fungi. As the environment changes, those species for which the habitat is no longer suitable drop out, leaving in the association only those that can exist under the new conditions. Insect communities in slash, logs, and dying trees have been studied by Hopkins (1893, 1899), Clemens (1916), Blackman and Stage (1918, 1924), Graham (1925), DeLeon (1934), Beal and Massey (1945), Howden and Vogt (1951), and others. The succession of communities of animals inhabiting slash, logs, and dying and dead trees has been shown by Adams (1915) and Savely (1939) to continue until the wood has disintegrated completely.