EVERGREEN, Colo. — Crews with Jefferson County Open Space (JCOS) are working to reduce a spike in pine beetles in ponderosa pine trees at an Evergreen park.
When the bark of infected trees is pulled back at Elk Meadow Park, the problem is clear.
Pine beetles burrow into the trees and lay their larva under the bark. The larva live right on top of the living tissue of the tree, suck up the nutrients and end up killing the tree.
They then pupate, turn into adults and fly off to the next tree.
Denver7 visited the park to see this problem firsthand and met up with Steve Murdock, the interim manager of JCOS' Natural Resource Stewardship.
"All the piles you see here are part of our active mountain pine beetle management project," he explained. "... Aerial detection surveys indicated that we're seeing an increase in pine beetle across the Front Range. So, it's not just an issue here at this park, but really across the entire state."
Pine beetles are part of a natural cycle — to an extent.
"We are totally OK with a few trees being killed from the pine beetle that creates variable habitat for our wildlife species, and so at a small scale, mountain pine beetle is a good thing," Murdock said.
However, the numbers that Colorado communities, including Jefferson County, are seeing are well above what would be beneficial for a forest.
According to JCOS, the number of beetle-infected trees before 2023 was below 100. But in 2024, it jumped up to 114, followed by 378 in 2025 so far.
According to experts, there are a few contributing factors.
"That's largely driven by two things. Climate change — the hotter and drier conditions that we've seen over the years increase the stress that the trees are feeling, which weakens their defenses against the beetle," Murdock explained. "There's also stress from overcrowding. Due to fire suppression over the last 200 or so years, there are many more trees on the landscape than would have been normally present had the healthy mixed-severity fires been allowed to persist for every 30 years or so. Now you have many more trees on the landscape competing for fewer and fewer resources, which only increases the stress that the trees feel, and again, continues to weaken their defenses."
He said a proactive approach is best with pine beetles. Unfortunately, by the time the needles have turned brown and red, it's too late and the beetles have moved on.
The trees have ways of defending themselves, and it's also a giveaway for forestry experts that there could be pine beetles that have infected an otherwise healthy looking tree: Pitch tubes are globs of sap the trees will push out as the beetles try to tunnel in. Oftentimes, trees with dozens of pitch tubes will have been infested with beetles.
The adult beetles also leave behind a fungus that gives trees a signature pine beetle blue stain. That has caught the eye of some Colorado companies who want to get those trees out of the forests and give them new life.
In 2019, Denver7 traveled to Evergreen to talk with the owners of Alpine Blue Home, who use this unique wood to create furniture and décor that can last generations.
“We’re fortunate that we have something so unique to work with and it’s sad that there’s so much of it,” owner Doug Golenz told us in 2019. “There’s this sense of connection if you’ve been to the mountains and you’ve seen the devastation… This is the silver lining of all that darkness.”
At Elk Meadow, the mitigation work continues to be active.
"Cutting down the tree and then processing it so that the tree is broken up into smaller pieces to expose the mountain pine beetle larvae to the elements, so to speak," Murdock said. "We either strip the bark away with a machine called a de-barker on a chainsaw that peels the bark off down to that living tissue, or we run these trees through a chipper."
Timing is everything. The crews need to mitigate what they can before the larva grow into beetles and can fly off. That happens around late June.
"We're cautiously optimistic. The best thing that we can do to mitigate this problem is proactive forest management and improving the health of the forest so that they're better able to withstand this pest in the future," he said.
Part of JCOS' plan to do that efficiently this time is to hire contractors that can operate heavy machinery.
The work for the 22 acres at Elm Meadow Park cost $98,550. The Colorado Strategic Wildfire Action Program and the Department of Natural Resources Executive Director's Office contributed $31,804.98 in grant funding, while JCOS is covering the cost of the remaining $66,745.02 out of their budget.
The project is expected to wrap up this summer.
Property owners can also help be proactive.
JCOS has put together information about property owners about how to spot the beetles and what treatment options are available. Click here for those resources.
