Forest under construction: Drought and bark beetles have affected the spruce trees near Königstein im Taunus. Now climate-stable trees are to grow back.
Image: Lucas Bäuml
Bare areas, dead spruces: the forest in the Taunus is vulnerable. But something grows back. Luckily for humans, because they cannot survive without a forest.
Dhe animal looks completely harmless. It is tiny, inconspicuously brown and also dead. Forester Carolin Pfaff searched the bark pieces on the forest floor for a few minutes until she found a specimen. Now she is holding some old bark in her hand and is looking at the lifeless beetle, a few millimeters in size, with the thin little legs. An impressive picture of damage can be seen in the wood, like the lines of a squiggly script. Live bark beetles can no longer be found in the Billtalhöhe area near Königstein im Taunus. The forest workers removed the infested spruces as quickly as possible.
The bark beetle, as everyone who reads the news now and then has known since the drought four years ago, is not harmless, but dangerous. For the forest and for people. Because he needs the forest, and that’s why he has to protect it. From beetles and other natural events, but especially from the dangers that emanate from humans themselves.